Abstract 5225
Background
Chemotherapy-induced alopecia (CIA) is a common and distressing side effect of chemotherapy treatment. Significant progress has been made during the past 2 decades in treating many of the side effects associated with cancer chemotherapy including emesis, hematopoietic cytopenias, xerostomia, infection, pain, and thrombosis. Similar progress has not been made in the prevention of CIA, apart from scalp cooling. We set out to examine the uptake, patient satisfaction and efficacy (as perceived by medical staff and patients) of scalp cooling treatment among patients receiving chemotherapy.
Methods
We reviewed a prospectively maintained database of patients who were offered scalp cooling treatment in our oncology dayward between 01/10/2014 and 22/06/2018. We analysed patient uptake and efficacy as perceived and recorded by medical staff (“medical efficacy”). A questionnaire was sent to patients who had accepted scalp cooling treatment and were alive at follow-up, to assess patient perceived efficacy and patient satisfaction. Patient perceived efficacy was compared to medical efficacy using the Fisher’s exact test.
Results
The mean age was 60.1 (SD 10.9) and 91.4% of the patients were female. Uptake for scalp cooling was 49% (120/245). 75% (90/120) of patients were alive at follow up and 51% (46/90) responded to the questionnaire. Scalp cooling was considered efficacious in 63% (29/46) of patients, versus 43.3% (52/120) as assessed by the medical team, Fishers test p = 0.0253. 86.9% of patients who accepted scalp cooling and responded to the questionnaire (40/46) agreed or strongly agreed that they were satisfied with their choice to try scalp cooling, and 67.4% (31/46) agreed or strongly agreed that their experience of scalp cooling was a positive one. There was a strong association between patient perceived efficacy and satisfaction (p < 0.001).
Conclusions
The use of scalp cooling to prevent chemotherapy induced alopecia is an effective treatment in our real-world population. Patients were more likely than the medical team to consider scalp cooling treatment effective. We found high levels of patient satisfaction with the decision to try scalp cooling, even among patients whose treatment was ineffective.
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.
Resources from the same session
5037 - CXCR4, CCR2 and CCR5 expression in subsets of tumor cells with stem and/or EMT features
Presenter: Olga Savelieva
Session: Poster Display session 1
Resources:
Abstract
5729 - Expression of mutant p53 affects cancer cell sensitivity to topotecan
Presenter: Rimma Mingaleeva
Session: Poster Display session 1
Resources:
Abstract
5725 - Breast cancer organoids a new tool for the prediction of drugs penetration and patient’outcome
Presenter: Giuseppina Roscigno
Session: Poster Display session 1
Resources:
Abstract
5680 - Aptamer-mediated exosomes detection for early breast cancer identification.
Presenter: Cristina Quintavalle
Session: Poster Display session 1
Resources:
Abstract
2460 - MicroRNA-181c promotes tamoxifen resistance in breast cancer cells via upregulation Akt/mTOR axis
Presenter: Alexander Scherbakov
Session: Poster Display session 1
Resources:
Abstract
3751 - Spatio-temporal separation of tumor infiltrating CD8+ T-cells and HER2/neu+ tumor cells in tumor-immune milieu of infiltrating ductal carcinoma of the breast
Presenter: Sandhya Sreedharan
Session: Poster Display session 1
Resources:
Abstract
4664 - Large genomic rearrangements in BRCA1 and BRCA2 genes in the Portuguese population.
Presenter: Joao Pinto
Session: Poster Display session 1
Resources:
Abstract
4611 - Non-BRCA1/2 hereditary breast and ovarian cancer: findings from a multidisciplinary program
Presenter: Ana Monteiro
Session: Poster Display session 1
Resources:
Abstract
5340 - Quantitative imaging and characterization of collagen patterns in high grade serous ovarian carcinoma (HGSOC)
Presenter: Ruby Huang
Session: Poster Display session 1
Resources:
Abstract
4209 - Semiquantitative assessment of vimentin expression in prostate cancer (PC)
Presenter: Marina Puchinskaya
Session: Poster Display session 1
Resources:
Abstract