Scan-associated distress, a common problem among patients with non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC), may negatively affect quality of life, according to a study published in the journal Lung Cancer.
Commonly referred to as “scanxiety,” diagnostic imaging has been known to be a major source of cancer-related distress; however, little research has been performed evaluating how this condition affects patient outcomes. Researchers led by Joshua M Baumi, MD, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, conducted a study to better define risk factors for scan-associated distress and its impact on quality of life among patients with NSCLC.
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For the study, they performed a cross-sectional survey of patients with recurrent or metastatic NSCLC treated at an academic medical center. Clinical and demographic data were collected through chart abstraction and patient self-report. A modified version of the Impact of Event Scale 6 (IES-6) was used to assess patient distress associated with scans, and quality of life was measured by using the Functional Assessment of Cancer Therapy – Lung resource.
A total of 103 patients with a median age of 67 years participated in the study; 61.2% were women and more than three-fourths were white (83%). At the study visit, the majority of patients (83%) reported some scan-associated distress. That anxiety was not associated with whether patients had received their scan recently, the severity of their disease, or time from initial diagnosis.
Further, scan-associated distress had a significant impact on patients’ quality of life (P = .004), with each increase in the IES-6 corresponding with about a one-unit decrease in FACT-L.
Thus, researchers concluded that not only is scan associated distress a common occurrence among patients with NSCLC, but that it also has the potential to negatively affect quality of life. Additionally, scan-associated distress did not correlate with time since diagnosis or how recent the scan had been performed, which suggests that anxiety from diagnostic scanning may be a persistent problem.
