OBJECTIVES

: Assess the quality of life (QoL) of cancer patients undergoing antineoplastic chemotherapy in Belo Horizonte hospitals, Brazil, in the first and second treatment cycles.

METHODS

: In this longitudinal prospective study there were included 315 cancer patients, aged 18 or older, who were starting chemotherapy for the first time. An instrument was developed for the collection of sociodemographic and clinical data. The EORTC QLQ-C30 version 3.0 was applied in first day of the first and second chemotherapy cycles to assess QoL. The distribution of QLQ-C30 scores was not normal and was checked by Kolmogorov-Smirnov analysis. The Wilcoxon test was used to identify significant differences in QoL between the two moments, considering p-value less than or equal to 0.05.

RESULTS

: Most of the patients were female (62.5%), were married (53%), with a mean age of 56.2 years and self-declared of brown color (56.2). The average monthly individual income was $319.20 and the average years of studies was of 6.2 years. The most frequent neoplasm was breast cancer (18.7%), followed by colorectal cancer (17.5%) and cervix (14.0%). The majority of patients underwent treatment by the public health system (93.3%) and had cancer in advanced stage at the time of diagnosis (70.8%). Comparing the QoL, it was observed that there was no significant difference in the general health status/QoL of the patients. However, there was a significant difference in emotional function (p <0.001) and the pain symptom (p = 0.001), with an improvement in the second cycle. In the symptoms nausea and vomiting (p <0.001) and diarrhea (p = 0.014) there was worsening in the second cycle.

CONCLUSIONS

Chemotherapy may have significant impacts on patients' QoL. Knowing the QoL of patients undergoing chemotherapy is important for guiding decision making in public policy, as well as helping health professionals in their relationship with the patient.