The effect on life quality of nasopharyngeal cancer patients through xerostomia decrease after intensity-modulated radiotherapy

Abstract

To evaluate the gain on the life quality of NPC from efforts to reduce the radiotherapy-induced xerostomia after IMRT. From August 2002 to December 2008, 235 patients with nasopharyngeal carcinoma were treated with IMRT in the First Affiliated Hospital of Wenzhou Medical College. Ninety-one patients with minimum 2 years of survival and no replaces and metastasis were enlisted. XQ and QOL questionnaires were completed at baseline, then 0, 3, 6, 9, 12, 18 and 24 months after IMRT. The XQ scores were substantially higher at the end of IMRT compared with baseline and descended over time. At 9 months post-RT, the XQ scores improved significantly (P = 0.024) and recovered nearly to baseline at 18 months post-RT. Likewise, the QOL scores were significantly higher at the end of IMRT compared with baseline (P = 0.012) and had a sequential trend towards improvement over the study period. At 18 months post-RT, the QOL scores almost recover to baseline (P = 0.020). Multiple comparisons testing revealed that communication, eating and pain sub-scale scores were significantly higher at the end of IMRT compared with baseline(P < 0.05) with the exception of emotion domain. There was a significant correlation between XQ scores and QOL scores in general in all the study time (r = 0.976, P < 0.001), also a significant position correlation was found between XQ scores and communication, eating sub-scale scores and overall bother scores. IMRT technique can reduce the incidence of postradiation xerostomia significantly and can improve the quality of life in many domains.