Quality of life among elderly women with breast cancer who received chemotherapy at Sohag Cancer Institute, Sohag Governorate

Abstract

Background Breast cancer is the most frequent cancer among women all over the world. Breast cancer risk increases with age and about a third of female breast cancers are diagnosed in patients aged older than 70 years. Elderly breast cancer patients are affected by poorer quality of life (QoL) compared with younger patients. Aim The current study aimed to assess QoL of elderly women with breast cancer who received chemotherapy at Cancer Institute, Sohag Governorate. Research questions What is the QoL of breast cancer elderly women who received chemotherapy at Sohag Cancer Institute? Design Cross-sectional descriptive design was utilized. Sample Purposive sample of 100 elderly women with breast cancer, who completed all cycles of chemotherapy 1–3 months at least from the last dose of chemotherapy. Setting This study was conducted at the oncology building at outpatient clinics for cancer patients follow-up at Sohag Cancer Institute. Tools (1) Structured interviewing questionnaire for demographic and medical data. (2) QoL scale to assess QoL issues relevant to breast cancer patients (Algamdi and Hanneman, 2016). Results The results revealed that selected breast cancer elderly women aged from 60 to 80 years with mean 63.47±4.87 years. Seventy-two percent of them could not read and write, and 62% of them lived in rural areas. Seventy-eight percent suffered from chronic diseases. The mean of social well-being domain was 2.98±0.56, the mean of emotional well-being domain was 2.32±1.34, the mean of physical well-being domain was 1.79±1.15, and the mean of total Functional Assessment of Cancer Therapy – Breast was 2.24±0.31. More than half of the women had poor QoL, more than one-third of them had fair QoL, and a minority had good QoL. Conclusion The current study concluded that 60% of the selected breast cancer elderly women had poor QoL, whereas 38% had fair QoL and only 2% had good QoL. Also, it revealed that more than half of women had poor physical, functional well-being, and additional concerns and about half of them had good social well-being. Recommendations The current study recommends use of QoL scale in elderly women with breast cancer in oncology outpatient clinics in different cancer institutes and conduction of health education programs and further research works for improving QoL in elderly women with breast cancer.