ESTRO 2024 - Abstract Book

S5684

RTT - Patient experience and quality of life

ESTRO 2024

A review of the literature was completed to identify PROMs used within HNC. The bibliographic databases MEDLINE, EMBASE and EMCARE were searched. The PICO framework was used to identify search terms. The searches were limited to publications from the 1st January 2008 to 1st June 2023. Published articles written in English, involving human patients, aged 16 and above, receiving external beam radiotherapy or PBT for HNC were eligible for inclusion. The PROMs utilised were extracted and subject to assessment within Microsoft Excel. The items (questions) within the PROMs were compared against the Royal College of Radiologists (RCR) site-specific side-effect guidelines [5] to assess for missing concepts. As per COSMIN methodology, construct, concept, and comprehensibility of the PROMs was also reviewed [4].

Results:

In total, 267 articles were identified in the search of which 15 fulfilled the inclusion criteria. There were 13 different PROMS used within these articles. Five were symptom-specific outcome measures and six were HNC disease specific. The rest were either generic cancer or HRQoL measures. The most common PROMS used were: EORTC QLQ-HN35 (n=5), EORTC-QLQ-C30 (n=4), HADS (n=2) and MDADI (n=2). All other measures were only identified once. When compared against the RCR site-specific side-effect guidance for HNC [5], the PROM that captured the most key concepts was the MDASI-HN questionnaire, followed by HNRQ and EORTC-QLQ-HN35 (Table 1). The main concept that was missing from 11 of the PROMs was items related to skin reactions and changes in skin texture/colour. As seen in Table 1, the only PROMs to include this concept was the MDASI-HN questionnaire and HNRQ.

Conclusion:

The main side-effect that was missing from the PROMS was assessment of skin reactions. This may be because the tools were aimed at post-surgical patients, whereas skin reactions are an integral part of radiotherapy [3, 6]. With 95% of patients treated with radiotherapy experiencing some form of skin reaction, it’s imperative that this