Prediction of survival in terminal cancer patients in Taiwan: constructing a prognostic scale

We prospectively identified prognostic factors and developed a prognostic scale in 356 Taiwanese terminal cancer patients (training set). Demographic data, severity of symptoms/signs, and survival were statistically analyzed to create the scale, which was tested in another 184 patients (testing set)...

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Published inJournal of pain and symptom management Vol. 28; no. 2; pp. 115 - 122
Main Authors Chuang, Rong-Bin, Hu, Wen-Yu, Chiu, Tai-Yuan, Chen, Ching-Yu
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published New York, NY Elsevier Inc 01.08.2004
Elsevier Science
Subjects
Adult
Aged
Biological and medical sciences
Female
Humans
Life Expectancy
Male
Medical sciences
Middle Aged
Neoplasms - mortality
palliative care
Pharmacology. Drug treatments
Prediction
Prognosis
Regression Analysis
Reproducibility of Results
Risk Assessment - methods
Risk Factors
Sensitivity and Specificity
survival
Survival Analysis
Survival Rate
Taiwan - epidemiology
terminal cancer patients
Terminal Care - statistics & numerical data
Terminally Ill - statistics & numerical data
Asia
Taiwan
terminal cancer patients
palliative care
Prediction
survival
Human
Prognosis
Palliative care
Malignant tumor
Survival
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Summary:We prospectively identified prognostic factors and developed a prognostic scale in 356 Taiwanese terminal cancer patients (training set). Demographic data, severity of symptoms/signs, and survival were statistically analyzed to create the scale, which was tested in another 184 patients (testing set). In the training set, liver and lung metastases, functional performance status, weight loss, edema, cognitive impairment, tiredness, and ascites were independently associated with shorter survival (multivariate analysis). The scale ranged from 0.0 (no altered variables) to 8.5 (maximal alteration for all variables). When scores were <3.5, 2-week survival was predicted with 0.72 and 0.61 accuracy for the training and testing sets, respectively. With scores <6.0, 1-week survival was predicted with 0.72 and 0.66 accuracy, respectively. This scale, which includes lung and liver metastases and severity of symptoms/signs, may help in identifying the stage of dying and its corresponding symptoms/signs and also in improving survival prediction in terminal cancer patients.
Bibliography:ObjectType-Article-2
SourceType-Scholarly Journals-1
ObjectType-Feature-1
content type line 23
ISSN:0885-3924
1873-6513
DOI:10.1016/j.jpainsymman.2003.11.008