Comparative aspects of the quality of life in cancer patients

Chronologically, neoplastic diseases can be divided into two categories of which the first includes the fast and aggressive disease groups which exhibit a short course after the diagnosis has been established and the second those with dormancy or a slow path of which the development extends over years, even decades. The developed treatment modalities have even expanded the time duration of both groups, and thus cancer has become a group of chronic diseases in many cases. This requires a special adaptation in regard to the life style and quality of the cancer patient. The assessment of the quality of life in the cancer patient has been evaluated through questionnaire to relatives and friends as well as through social experience with cancer patients. The diversity of the disease group is reflected in the need for a more heterogeneous improvement of life style and its quality according to the need of the patient groups. A distinction can be made between acute and chronically ill pediatric patients, the cancer patient who is able to continue his work, the outpatient not requiring hospitalization, the patient with the need for hospital care (for a shorter or longer Period), the hospice patient, the elderly patient, and the terminally ill patient as well as the patient in the last days of life. In a study of 1,227 elderly decedents in Fairfield County, Connecticut, for which 260 respondents reported cancer as the cause of death, approximately 1/5 were reported to have been in moderate or severe pain six hours before death, with little change from the previous month.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)