Evaluation of Quality of Life in Cancer Clinical Trials

Quality of life is an important consideration when making treatment decisions [1–3]. The choice of one treatment option over another for an individual patient may hinge on how the treatments affect quality of life. Therefore, it is important that the practicing oncologist has a thorough understanding of the potential impacts that treatments can have on quality of life in general as well as an understanding of the individual patient’s needs and preferences. To help address these issues, the evaluation of quality of life is taking on an increasingly larger role in cancer clinical research. In particular, patient-oriented quality-of-life assessments are frequently being included in clinical trials as study endpoints for treatment comparisons. The purpose of this chapter is to provide an overview of the most common methods used in cancer clinical trials for the evaluation of quality of life.