Determinants of Quality of Life in Women living with Breast Cancer in Southwest Nigeria

Background: The quality of life (QOL) among women with breast cancer is hampered in areas of social, emotional, and sexual functioning and this could persist even years after treatment. It is an important parameter for monitoring disease progression at the early stage. Hence, this study aimed to determine the factors associated with the overall quality of life among subjects living with breast cancer.

Methods: The study was a comparative cross-sectional design conducted among women with breast cancer attending the General Surgical Outpatient clinic of LAUTECH Teaching Hospital Ogbomoso and a comparison group of age-matched control. The instrument used include the World Health Organization Quality of Life-BREF and socio-demographic and clinical variable questionnaire in 240 interviewer-administered questionnaires. Data were analyzed using SPSS version 21. A P-value of less than 0.05 was taken as statistically significant. The predictors of overall QOL were analyzed using a binary logistic regression.

Results: All QOL domain scores were significantly higher among controls than in subjects with breast cancer. ρ-value = 0.001. Level of education and duration of diagnosis had a statistically significant association with the overall quality of life, P-value< 0.05. Respondents who attained a tertiary level of education were 0.040 times less likely to have a poor quality of life compared to respondents that were not educated (P-value= 0.038) and the odds of having a poor overall quality of life decreased with duration since diagnosis P-value= 0.049.

Conclusion: Our study shows that women with breast cancer experience a lower QOL, especially in the physical, psychological and social domains than women without the disease. Also, the level of education, employment and marital status, and duration since diagnosis were major factors influencing QOL. Assessment of QOL is an important metric that should be incorporated into the breast cancer treatment program.