Quality of life in disease-free gastric adenocarcinoma survivors: impacts of clinical stages and reconstructive surgical procedures.

Aim: To investigate health-related quality of life data of disease-free gastric adenocarcinoma survivors, with special emphasis on the roles of clinical stages and reconstructive surgical procedures.

Methods: We performed a cross-sectional study in 51 disease-free gastric adenocarcinoma patients. The patients had been followed for at least 6 (median 17, range from 6 months to 2 years) months after initial radical surgery. The Taiwan Chinese version of the European Organization for Research and Treatment of Cancer Quality of Life Questionnaire Cancer 30 (EORTC QLQ-C30) and the supplementary gastric cancer module QLQ-STO22 were used as outcome measures.

Results: Patients with earlier-/advanced-stage diseases (American Joint Committee on Cancer stages I and II vs. III and IV) had a similar quality of life in terms of global health status and functional and symptomatic well-being. Subtotal gastrectomy outweighed total gastrectomy with better role function and less nausea/vomiting and appetite loss. Multivariate regression analyses also proved that proximal gastric preservation was predictive of better role function, less nausea/vomiting, and less appetite loss.

Conclusions: Gastric adenocarcinoma survivors may enjoy a similar life quality, regardless of their original disease stages. Functional preservation may have marginal advantages to improve patients' quality of life by reducing symptomatic nausea, vomiting, and appetite loss postoperatively.