Impacts of treatments on the quality of life among esophageal squamous cell carcinoma patients

Summary This study aims to investigate the effects of treatments on the quality of life for patients with esophageal squamous cell carcinoma patients diagnosed at early and late stages. From a medical center in central Taiwan, patients who had been diagnosed with esophageal squamous cell carcinoma from February 2007 and March 2011 were recruited. Using the European Organisation for Research and Treatment of Cancer Quality of Life Questionnaire Core 30 (EORTC QLQ-C30) and the Quality of Life Questionnaire Oesophageal 18 (QLQ-OES18), quality of life scores for 105 esophageal squamous cell carcinoma patients were obtained and assessed. Multivariate analysis was performed on the quality of life scores after stratification by cancer stage. Among early-stage esophageal squamous cell carcinoma patients, those received only surgery (S-only) performed better in physical and social functioning compared with patients who underwent surgery and concurrent chemoradiotherapy (S+CCRT) (β = 9.0, P = 0.03; β = 12.1, P = 0.04, respectively). For those that received only concurrent chemoradiotherapy (CCRT-only), they performed worse in role and emotional functioning relative to S+CCRT patients (β = −17.2, P = 0.02; β = −15.7, P = 0.05, respectively). Among late-stage patients, CCRT-only treatment gave insignificantly better global health status and functional scale scores and less severe symptoms compared to the S+CCRT option. Better functional scores and less aggravated symptoms are observed in early-stage esophageal squamous cell carcinoma patients who received surgery-only treatment relative to those that underwent both surgery and chemoradiotherapy. For late-stage esophageal cancer patients, the measured difference of quality of life is not significant between CCRT-only and S+CCRT treatments.