McGrath C, Chang L, Dennis K. Exploring the nausea experience among female patients with breast cancer; A pilot interview study.
Tech Innov Patient Support Radiat Oncol 2020;
15:22-28. [PMID:
32904172 PMCID:
PMC7451752 DOI:
10.1016/j.tipsro.2020.07.002]
[Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/17/2020] [Revised: 07/21/2020] [Accepted: 07/28/2020] [Indexed: 02/08/2023] Open
Abstract
Nausea is a complicated symptom to report and measure in clinical trials.
Better understanding the nausea experience will improve clinical trial designs.
Patients have preferences for symptom definitions and nausea grading scales.
Patients experience different intensities of nausea.
Describing nausea sub-features like duration, timing and character is difficult.
Introduction
Nausea is a difficult symptom to report and measure in clinical trials. We conducted a pilot interview study to improve our understanding of the nausea experience.
Materials and methods
Female patients with breast cancer that had experienced nausea during radiation therapy and/or chemotherapy underwent semi-structured interviews that focused on patient-defined and standard definitions, preferences for nausea grading scales, and nausea sub-features: intensity, location, timing/duration, character, associated symptoms, precipitating/alleviating factors, impact on quality of life.
Results
10 patients were interviewed. Patients defined nausea more variably than vomiting and retching/dry heaving. An ordinal grading scale with a 0–10 intensity range was preferred over visual-analogue and qualitative scales. Patients had experienced different intensities of nausea and deemed reporting their worst, average and least intensities feasible. High-intensity episodes were deemed more problematic than low-intensity episodes regardless of their duration. The duration and character of nausea were difficult to describe. A range of associated symptoms, precipitating and alleviating factors were documented. Nausea had a detrimental impact on quality of life.
Conclusions
Nausea has a range of subjective and objective features. Our pilot study provided valuable information that will inform the design of a planned larger survey study. Creating an operational clinical trial definition for nausea appears feasible.
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