Longitudinal Trajectory of Patient-Reported Fatigue in Patients Undergoing Thoracoscopic Lung Cancer Surgery

Postoperative fatigue is widely recognized as one of the most prevalent adverse effects of surgery, representing a critical determinant of functional recovery and quality of life. However, fatigue is commonly measured at a single time point, failing to capture its dynamic nature. This study aimed to characterize the longitudinal trajectories of postoperative fatigue and identify the potential factors.

This retrospective study included patients with lung cancer who underwent thoracoscopic surgery between March 2021 and October 2023. Patients completed the Perioperative Symptom Assessment for Lung Surgery Scale (PSA-Lung) daily for 7 days after surgery. Latent class mixed modeling was used to analyze the longitudinal patient-reported data and identify subgroups based on trajectory features.

A total of 1,096 patients were included. Three-cluster trajectory model provided the best fit, consisting of deterioration-fatigue group (17.7%), recovery-fatigue group (31.4%) and mild-fatigue group (50.9%). Compared with the mild-fatigue group, patients with comorbidities had a higher risk of being categorized into the recovery-fatigue group (odds ratio 1.44, 95% confidence interval 1.02-2.04; p = 0.040). The presence of recovery-fatigue was associated with lower preoperative hemoglobin level (p = 0.025). Moreover, lower preoperative body mass index and albumin level increased the likelihood of being classified as the deterioration-fatigue group (p = 0.022 and p = 0.026, respectively).

This study elucidated the heterogeneity of fatigue trajectories, with half of the patients experiencing either recovery-fatigue or deterioration-fatigue. The severity of postoperative fatigue was found to be worse in patients with comorbidities or poor nutritional status.