Study: Colon, Rectal Cancer Care Doesn’t Hurt Life Quality

BURGANDY, France — French colon and rectal cancer patients who are treated with chemotherapy or radiation and are 75 years or older don’t report poorer quality of life than their peers who haven’t had such treatment, according to a French study by the Burgundy Digestive Cancer Registry.

In fact, the chemotherapy patients reported better physical health than their peers reported. The survey was administered through questionnaires and included queries about quality of life that followed the year after diagnosis.

According to writer Kate Murphy, who reported about the study for Colorectal Cancer Coalition (C3), “Overall health and emotional functioning improved between the first questionnaire at three months and the twelve month survey for people with colon cancer,” she wrote. “For rectal cancer patients, scores improved between six months and 12 months.”

This may be the first study that examines quality of life over time for colon and rectal cancer patients, according to Anne-Marie Bouvier, MD, PhD of the Burgundy Digestive Cancer Registry.

“Providing evidence that adjuvant chemotherapy for colon cancer has no negative impact on the (quality of life) of elderly patients is of great significance in encouraging clinicians to treat this population,” she wrote.

Sources: Colorectal Cancer Coalition

               Bouvier et al., Cancer, Volume 113, Number 4, August 15, 2008.