Quality of life end points in cancer clinical trials: review and recommendations

In this presentation, issues that influenced the development of policies for inclusion of quality of life end points in certain Southwest Oncology Group clinical trials are reviewed. The key policies recommended by us and adopted by the Cancer Control Research Committee of the Southwest Oncology Group are as follows: (a) Begin assessment of quality of life in specific types of phase III protocols. (b) Always measure physical functioning, emotional functioning, symptoms (general and protocol specific), and global quality of life separately. (c) Include measures of social functioning and additional protocol-specific measures if resources permit. (d) Use patient-based questionnaires with psychometric properties that have been documented in published studies. In this review, we also recommend specific questionnaires. Our recommendations may prove useful for other cancer clinical trials groups and for multi-institution trials of treatment for chronic diseases.