Background: Breast cancer is the most common cancer in women and therefore represents a major problem in public health. Data from patients' self-report questionnaires provide valuable information about the side-effects that patients may view as having a significantly detrimental impact on their quality of life (QOL) and yet are not always recognized as important by healthcare professionals. Cosmetology is a specific care for patients and there is actually no scientific evidence regarding effects on QOL for women with breast cancer.
Objective: The purpose of this study is to assess the impact of cosmetic care on QOL in breast cancer patients during chemotherapy and radiotherapy.
Methods: We developed a prospective, multicentre, randomized, controlled study including 27 patients. All the patients had to fill in a French-validated dermatologic specific quality-of-life questionnaire to compare the QOL of the two groups, the cosmetic group and the control group, at three different times of the adjuvant treatment.
Results: The results show a statistically significant difference between the cosmetic group and the control group in two areas of QOL: mood state and self-perception of the disease.
Conclusion: This study emphasizes the interest of cosmetic care in breast cancer patients. However, further larger trials are needed to confirm this study.