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Temporal Changes in Quality of Life (QoL) of Patients With Primary Brain Tumors: Raw QoL Data From a Randomized Trial as Reference for Future Studies

Department of Radiation Oncology, Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg, Würzburg, Germany

To the Editor:

I read with great interest the recent article by Taphoorn et al¹ on the specific quality-of-life (QoL) effects of radiotherapy versus radiotherapy followed by chemotherapy with procarbazine, lomustine and vincristine in patients with anaplastic oligodendroglioma treated on European Organisation for Research and Treatment of Cancer (EORTC) trial 26951. The authors must be congratulated for their effort to collect prospective QoL data with acceptable compliance rates over a long time period, documenting moderately increased nausea/vomiting, loss of appetite, and drowsiness in the chemotherapy arm.

The authors describe selecting seven scales for primary statistical analysis—five from the generic EORTC Quality of Life Questionnaire C30 (overall QoL, physical function, social function, fatigue, and nausea/vomiting) and two from the brain-specific module BN20 (communication deficit and seizures)—and performed exploratory analyses on the remaining scales. Apart from determining differential treatment effects among arms of the randomized trials, it would be highly interesting for the scientific community to understand the temporal development of QoL in patients with intermediate-prognosis primary brain tumors. In their recent article, Taphoorn et al present raw QoL data only for three of the seven preselected domains (fatigue, nausea/vomiting, and physical function), but not global QoL, social function, or any part of the BN20 module. The latter would be of particular interest as full validation of the brain-specific module has not been published, and there is a need for reference data, adding to the authors' previous publication on QoL in patients with glioblastoma multiforme.²

In their present manuscript, the authors state, "it is evident from the seven preselected primary health-related QoL scales, that overall health-related QoL was considerably impaired in both groups at baseline compared with reference values." Although one would expect that QoL in oligodendroglioma patients after surgery/biopsy is worse than in the general population, this statement cannot be verified by the reader because no relevant descriptive QoL data are presented (except for physical function) for the study cohorts, and no characteristics of patients participating in the QoL study (eg, patient age) are described.

It would therefore be of great interest to make more raw QoL data from this important trial available to allow comparison with other groups of brain tumor patients.

AUTHORS' DISCLOSURES OF POTENTIAL CONFLICTS OF INTEREST

The author(s) indicated no potential conflicts of interest.

REFERENCES

1. Taphoorn MJ, van den Bent MJ, Mauer ME, et al: Health-related quality of life in patients treated for anaplastic oligodendroglioma with adjuvant chemotherapy: Results of a European Organisation for Research and Treatment of Cancer randomized clinical trial. J Clin Oncol 25:5723-5730, 2007[Abstract/Free Full Text]

2. Taphoorn MJ, Stupp R, Coens C, et al: Health-related quality of life in patients with glioblastoma: A randomised controlled trial. Lancet Oncol 6:937-944, 2005[CrossRef][Medline]

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  Martin J.B. Taphoorn, Martin J. van den Bent, Murielle Mauer, and Andrew Bottomley
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