357MO - Comparison of long-term quality of life between survivors of adolescent and adult nasopharyngeal carcinoma

Background

Nasopharyngeal carcinoma (NPC) is not commonly observed in adolescents. The late sequelae and long-term survival outcomes diverge between adult and adolescent survivors of NPC. This study was to compare the differences between these two cohorts and evaluate the socio-demographic and clinical factors that have the most significant impact on different aspects of quality of life.

Methods

A total of 420 survivors could be included (195 adolescent and 225 adult survivors). To balance the influence of covariates and potential bias, we used the propensity score matching (PSM) method to match adolescent and adult patients at a ratio of 1:1. Ultimately, we included 155 adolescent and 155 adult survivors in the subsequent analysis. The EORTC QLQ-C30 consists of 30 items spread across 15 dimensions, comprising of 5 functional dimensions, 1 dimension measuring Global health status/QoL, and individual symptom items. The functioning and QoL scales are such that a higher score indicates better health, whereas a higher score on the symptom scales indicates a higher severity of symptoms.

Results

In terms of Global health status, adolescent patients had higher scores than those of adult patients (adolescent: 80.2±12.7; adult: 77.2±11.5; P=0.027). Furthermore, there were also differences in the Functional Scale/Items. Adolescent patients scored higher in Physical functioning (adolescent: 98.5±4.6; adult: 95.1±7.0; P<0.001), Role functioning (adolescent: 97.0±9.2; adult: 90.5±15.2; P<0.001),and Social functioning (adolescent: 96.0±9.0; adult: 93.5±11.8; P=0.038) but had worse Cognitive functioning (adolescent: 88.3±9.9; adult: 93.8±12.6; P<0.001) scores than adult patients. There were also differences in the symptom scale/items, including insomnia (adolescent: 1.9±7.8; adult: 13.1±22.3; P<0.001), constipation (adolescent: 1.29±7.5; adult: 8.0±17.4; P<0.001) and diarrhea (adolescent: 0.65±4.6; adult: 2.8±9.2; P=0.010).

Conclusions

We can infer that adolescent NPC patients are a particular group of patients that, compared to adult patients achieve better survival outcomes, and experience less treatment-related long-term toxicity, and a higher quality of life in the long term.

Clinical trial identification

Editorial acknowledgement

Legal entity responsible for the study

The authors.

Funding

Has not received any funding.

Disclosure

All authors have declared no conflicts of interest.