Effect of regional and systemic fluorinated pyrimidine chemotherapy on quality of life in colorectal liver metastasis patients

Purpose: Since systemic and regional (HAI) fluorinated pyrimidine chemotherapies offer similar survival benefit in treatment of colorectal liver metastases (CLM), we sought to identify their impact on quality of life (QoL), which might be a useful indicator of treatment preference. Methods: We compared Oat. in 135 CLM patients managed by symptom control (n = 49 patients), systemic fluorouracil (5FU)/folinic: acid (n = 35), or hepatic arterial floxuridine (FUDR) (n = 51). Full blood count and liver function tests, World Health Organization (WHO) toxicity criteria, and QoL (Rotterdam Symptom Checklist [RSC], the Sickness Impact Profile [SIP], and the Hospital Anxiety and Depression scale [HAD]) were measured monthly in all patients, Results: The HAD anxiety score was significantly increased in symptom control compared with chemotherapy patients 1 month after randomization. There was a significant increase in RSC physical score (repeated measures, P = .05), and in scores for sore mouth (P < .01), dry mouth (P < .01), and tingling hands and feet (P < .01) in systemic chemotherapy compared with symptom control patients. Significant QoL differences (repeated measures and Monn-Whitney U [MWU]) between HAI and symptom control patients were not detected. Systemic chemotherapy patients lived for significantly longer (log-rank test, P less than or equal to .0001) with abnormal HAD anxiety, RSC psychosocial, or RSC sore mouth scores compared with HAI patients, but there were no overall survival differences. Conclusion: Randomization to symptom control only was associated with increased anxiety. QoL with systemic chemotherapy was impaired by side effects. HAI wets associated with similar survival to systemic chemotherapy but with better sustained QoL. (C) 1997 by American Society of Clinical Oncology.