Effect of Postoperative Adjuvant Radiotherapy on Quality of Life, Anxiety, and Depression in Adult Female Breast Cancer Patients.

Aim: This study aims to identify anxiety and depression caused by adjuvant radiotherapy in breast cancer cases to determine the deterioration in the quality of life and investigate the effect of early treatment.

Materials And Methods: In this study, the Beck Depression Inventory, Beck Anxiety Inventory, and European Organisation for Research and Treatment of Cancer Quality of Life Questionnaire-30 (EORTC QLQ-C30) Turkish 3.0 forms were evaluated in 63 breast cancer patients before the start of radiotherapy treatment (T1) and at six weeks after the end of radiotherapy treatment (T2).

Results: A high level of anxiety was detected in 77.8% of patients, and depression was found in 25.4% of patients in T1. When depressive cases were evaluated with EORTC QLQ-C30 scores, the general health status ( = 0.043), role function ( = 0.027), emotional ( < 0.002), cognitive ( < 0.001), and social ( < 0.0001) scales were statistically lower in T1, whereas pain ( = 0.045) and insomnia ( < 0.0001) symptoms were higher in T1. Anxiety and EORTC QLQ-C30 scores in terms of emotional function ( = 0.015), social function ( < 0.003), and symptoms of insomnia ( = 0.027) were found to be statistically higher in T1 anxious cases. However, anxiety was detected in only 3% of T2 cases, and no depression was found in any of the cases. Anxiety and EORTC QLQ-C30 scores and symptom scales were evaluated in terms of role function ( < 0.0001), emotional ( = 0.041) and social scales ( = 0.014), fatigue ( = 0.028), pain ( = 0.033), insomnia ( = 0.011), and constipation ( < 0.0001); these were found to be statistically significant in T2.

Conclusion: This study revealed that early diagnosis and treatment of anxiety before initiating adjuvant radiotherapy reduces the development of long-term anxiety-related depression in the future. Therefore, it is recommended that patients be evaluated for anxiety and depression before starting adjuvant radiotherapy.