Patients’ preferences for adjuvant chemotherapy in early-stage breast cancer: is treatment worthwhile?

When making decisions about adjuvant chemotherapy for early-stage breast cancer, costs and benefits of treatment should be carefully weighed. In this process, patients’ preferences are of major importance. The objectives of the present study were: (1) to determine the minimum benefits that patients need to find chemotherapy acceptable, and (2) to explore potential preference determinants, namely: positive experience of the treatment, reconciliation with the treatment decision, and demographic variables. Preferences were elicited from patients scheduled for adjuvant chemotherapy (chemotherapy group: n = 38) before (T 1 ), during (T 2 ), and 1 month after chemotherapy (T 3 ), and were compared to responses from patients not scheduled for chemotherapy (no-chemotherapy group: n = 38). The patients were asked, for a hypothetical situation, to indicate the minimum benefit (in terms of improved 5-year disease-free survival) to find adjuvant chemotherapy acceptable. In the chemotherapy group, the median benefit was 1% at all 3 measurement points. In the no-chemotherapy group the attitude towards chemotherapy became more negative over time, although not statistically significantly so (T 1 : 12%, T 2 : 15%, T 3 : 15%; P = 0.10). At all measurement points, the patients in the chemotherapy group indicated that they would accept chemotherapy for significantly ( P < 0.01) less benefit than the patients in the no-chemotherapy group. Of the demographic variables, age was related to preferences, but only at T 2 and only in the no-chemotherapy group. The more positive attitude towards chemotherapy and the stability of preferences in the chemotherapy group indicated that reconciliation with the treatment decision was a more important determinant of patients’ preferences than positive experience of the treatment. © 2001 Cancer Research Campaign http://www.bjcancer.com