Pilot Testing of a New App for Prospective Evaluation of Health-related Quality of Life in Breast Cancer
Abstract Background: Given that BC patients now live longer and have a higher survival rate, long-term side effects of primary treatment and patients' Life Quality (LQ) have become a more central issue. The purpose of this study was to investigate whether Life Quality changes after primary BC treatment.Method: A prospective cohort study was conducted including 149 Danish women with BC. Sixty had entered the date since chemotherapy termination and their daily measurement of QoL for mood in the app Bone@BC. All users can only enter the app with a Danish NemID and own mobile device. The app includes self-reported patient baseline characteristics related to BC treatment and simple self-reported data of LQ measured in mood, social life and wellbeing measured by fatigue, pain and appetite and physical activities. Results: During the pilot test period, 149 BC survivors entered baseline data. Of the 149 BC survivors 60 (40%) have entered chemotherapy history and LQ data. The mean age of the BC survivors was 58.2 ±9.6 years (range 27-78 years). Days since chemotherapy termination was with a mean of 450 days (range 54-5.175 days). In group A (n=20) 35% reported 0-365 days and in group B (n=39) 65% reported more than 365 days since chemotherapy termination. In the whole group 65% reported neutral mood. By division into group A vs. B showed that mood improve over time measured by several in group B had a neutral mood achieved. Half (53%) had a good social life. Similar changes were reported for pain with 79% reporting mild to moderate pain in the whole group, group A vs. B showed an increasing level of pain over time with 24% reporting moderate to severe pain in group B vs. 13% in group A. Finally, it was observed that 58% reported mild to moderate appetite and it is decreasing over time, 64% reported mild to moderate appetite in group B vs. 50% in group A. Conclusion: Our results indicate that BC survivors have impaired QoL up to several years after primary BC treatment but there is a trend of some improvement over time. Trial registration: ClinicalTrials.grov:NCT03784651