Purpose: The purpose of this study was to access changes in health-related quality of life (HRQoL) caused by radioiodine therapy (RAI) in thyroid cancer patients.
Methods: Prospective cohort study at Brazilian National Cancer Institute with patients enrolled between March 2015 and June 2017. RAI was performed by administration of 1.11 to 9.25 GBq of Na131I. EORTC QLQ-C30 v3 and EORTC QLQ-H&N35 questionnaires were applied to determine HRQoL at baseline, 1 week and 3 months after RAI. HRQoL during follow-up was evaluated by calculation of score absolute changes in each domain. Descriptive analysis was performed by measures of central tendency and dispersion. Changes in HRQoL were evaluated by paired t-test. The association between social demographic and clinical data and HRQoL was assessed by univariate linear regression for significantly changed domains, and p < 0.05 was considered significant.
Results: An improvement on global HRQoL and social Function post-therapy (p = 0.002 and p < 0.001) and on role (p = 0.038), emotional (p < 0.001), and cognitive function (p = 0.016) during RAI were observed. Nausea and vomiting (p < 0,001), pain (p < 0.001), sensitivity problems (p < 0.001), problems with social contact (p < 0.001), dry mouth (p = 0.007), and sticky saliva (p = 0.001) increased during RAI. Females were more sensible to changes in nausea and vomiting, and patients < 55 years experienced higher changes in sense during RAI.
Conclusions: Although RAI might affect HRQoL negatively, patients experienced an improvement on global HRQoL and symptoms reduction post-therapy.
Keywords: Differentiated thyroid cancer; Health-related quality of life; Iodine-131; Radioiodine therapy; Thyroid carcinoma.