By Rebecca A. Clay Being able to worry about quality of life for cancer survivors is a relatively recent luxury. Now that number is in the thousands. There has been a logarithmic increase in interest in quality of life for cancer patients. With the number of survivors now surpassing eight million in this country alone, Cella and other psychologists are developing instruments to assess survivors' quality of life. These tools can help patients, practitioners and researchers predict outcomes, compare treatments and target interventions most effectively.
Today there's more work on quality of life done in cancer than in any other disease.
Since translated into more than 30 languages, FACT consists of general questions about physical, functional, emotional and social well-being, plus specific questions for each type of cancer. Take Cella's recent study of lung-cancer patients, for example. Changes in FACT scores also helped predict outcomes, Cella discovered. Those whose scores started out high and rose during treatment had a 16-month median survival rate. Cella is now working on a project that will help physicians use FACT scores as they make decisions about their patients' treatment.