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Health-Related Quality of Life in Pediatric Cancer Survivors: Assessing the Impacts

Health-Related Quality of Life in Pediatric Cancer Survivors: Assessing the Impacts 1024 683 Madison Storm

Family factors have a significant impact on health-related quality of life.

Childhood cancer is a life-changing diagnosis for children and their families. Children undergoing cancer treatment often experience impairment in health-related quality of life compared to children from healthy populations. The severity of impact can depend, in part, on social determinants of health, such as the family’s sociodemographic background.

In a recent study, published in Pediatric Blood & Cancer, from the lab of Cynthia Gerhardt, PhD, principal investigator in the Center for Biobehavioral Health at Nationwide Children’s Hospital, researchers examined how family factors such as stress and communication, affected long-term health-related quality of life (HRQOL) in survivors of pediatric cancer, in combination with pre-existing sociodemographic factors, such as family income, education, race and number of children living in the household.

While this topic has been studied previously, “most research has focused on the role of diagnosis or side effects from treatment that influence HRQOL in survivors,” says Valdeoso Patterson, previous clinical research coordinator for the Gerhardt Lab and lead author of the study. “Few studies have identified early family factors that may be related to long-term quality of life.”

Researchers hypothesized that, when analyzed alongside cancer-related stress and parent-adolescent communication, greater cumulative sociodemographic risk would result in lower levels of HRQOL in survivors. However, findings showed that sociodemographic risk was not a significant predictor of HRQOL when combined with the family factors examined.

“Findings demonstrated the importance of more proximal family factors in relation to long-term quality of life in survivors of pediatric cancer and their families,” says Patterson.

“Our lab is interested in a variety of individual, family, medical and environmental factors that may increase risk or promote resilience in children with cancer,” says Dr. Gerhardt, who is also the chief clinical research officer at Nationwide Children’s. “The goal is to learn what hinders and what helps children adapt to adversity so we can develop better interventions and provide better care.”

The team’s findings have helped support that goal, with suggested implementation starting early in treatment, as their study examined variables measured near initial diagnosis that predicted HRQOL five years later.

“Regardless of known sociodemographic risk factors that often affect health, health care professionals should focus on early interventions that reduce family stress and strengthen parent-adolescent communication to improve HRQOL in survivors and their families,” says Patterson. “Clinicians should assess family stress and facilitate open and honest communication among parents and children to optimize well-being.”

The Gerhardt Lab is currently developing and testing several digital health interventions to promote positive parenting, self-care and coping strategies like problem solving in families of children with cancer and young adult survivors.

This article also appears in the Fall/Winter 2024 print issue. Download the full issue.

 

Reference:

Patterson V, Olsavsky A, Garcia D, Sutherland-Foggio M, Vannatta K, Prussien KV, Bemis H, Compas BE, Gerhardt CA. Impact of sociodemographic factors, stress, and communication on health-related quality of life in survivors of pediatric cancer. Pediatric Blood & Cancer. 2024;71(7):e31001.

Image credit: Nationwide Children’s

About the author

Senior Strategist, Research Communications | Website

Madison Storm is the Senior Strategist of Research Communications at Nationwide Children's Hospital. She earned her bachelor's in multimedia journalism from Virginia Tech in 2021 and went on to achieve her master's in health communication from Johns Hopkins University in 2023. Her passion for transforming the complex to clear is supported by various experiences writing for consumer audiences.

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