The burden of fear of cancer recurrence in genitourinary cancers - a prospective study (NCT04535921)

Introduction: Fear of cancer recurrence (FCR) is a challenging and often unaddressed concern and predictive factors for high FCR remain unclear. Therefore, the aim of the current study is to assess predictive factors for high FCR in patients undergoing surgery for genitourinary cancer. Materials and methods: Overall, 525 patients were prospectively included. FCR was measured using the validated FCR7-questionnaire prior to surgery and after receipt of the histological result. Family-support, religiousness, quality-of-life-impairment due to FCR and distress were determined. Patient and tumor-related factors were compared with FCR levels using Mann-Whitney-U-Test or Wilcoxon-Test. Multivariate analysis was performed by linear/binary regression. Results: FCR after receipt of the final histology was significantly lower (median 13, range 6-34) than before surgery (median 15, range 6-36, p<0.001). In univariate analysis, significant impact on preoperative FCR was observed for gender (p=0.017), age (p=0.002), working status (p=0.038) and education (p=0.002). High impairment of QoL was associated with higher FCR levels (p<0.001). Comparing tumor-related factors with FCR, we observed significantly higher FCR scores in patients with non-organ-confined disease (p=0.011). Conclusion: This study is the first to describe FCR in patients with genitourinary cancers. Surgical treatment improves FCR. Sociodemographic factors like age, female gender, employment and education were observed to influence FCR levels. Strong correlations between FCR, QoL and psychological distress indicate the importance of further clinical screening for FCR. Tumor-related factors however seem to play a less prominent role.

Automated summary

This study explores predictive factors for high fear of cancer recurrence (FCR) in patients undergoing surgery for genitourinary cancer. The results indicate a decrease in FCR after surgery, with sociodemographic factors such as age, gender, employment, and education influencing FCR levels, while tumor-related factors have a less prominent role.