Attitudes of prostate cancer patients towards the diagnosis and treatment of their disease: findings from a multinational survey

ABSTRACT

Objective: To explore the attitudes of patients with locally advanced or metastatic prostate cancer towards the diagnosis and treatment of their disease.

Research design and methods: Patients who had been receiving hormonal therapy for ≥1 year were recruited from France, Germany, Italy, Spain, the UK and the USA. All patients were required to complete a 10- to 15-minute fully structured questionnaire (either online or on paper) during September 2006.

Results: A total of 382 patients completed the questionnaire. Patients were currently receiving luteinising hormone-releasing hormone agonist monotherapy (73%), antiandrogen monotherapy (10%), or combined androgen blockade (17%). Since diagnosis, while being treated with hormonal therapy, many patients felt that they had a more reasonable quality of life (36%) and were more able to lead an active life (36%). Although patients generally wanted to be involved in treatment decisions, many felt they had missed out on hormonal treatment options (26%) and/or were unaware of all the treatment options available (29%). Patients felt that information on hormonal treatments from their specialist physician could be trusted more than that from other sources. The most important factors for patients in terms of their treatment were disease control (39%) and outliving their disease (31%).

Conclusions: Patients can miss information regarding their disease and the hormonal treatments available. As patients place the most emphasis on disease control and outliving their disease, and may experience improved quality of life while on hormonal therapy, physicians should not exclude treatment options on the basis of potential side effects alone.

Key words: :

• Antiandrogen
• Combined androgen blockade
• Luteinising hormone-releasing hormone agonist
• Prostate cancer
• Questionnaire