Palliative Radiotherapy with or without Additional Care by a Multidisciplinary Palliative Care Team: A Retrospective Comparison
Table 1
Patient characteristics.
Univariate analysis of baseline parameters for patients’ individual RT courses administered with or without care by multidisciplinary palliative care team (MPCT)
Parameter
Without MPCT number of RT courses (%)
With MPCT number of RT courses (%)
value
Patient number
382
140
ECOG performance status
0
60 (16)
9 (6)
1
112 (29)
30 (21)
2
116 (30)
50 (36)
3
82 (21)
45 (32)
4
12 (3)
6 (4)
0.004
Familya
Single
102 (27)
48 (34)
Married
212 (55)
73 (52)
Partner
26 (7)
15 (11)
0.185
Age at RT (years)
<65
104 (27)
60 (43)
65–69
70 (18)
20 (14)
70–74
52 (14)
22 (16)
75–79
86 (23)
20 (14)
≥80
70 (18)
18 (13)
0.006
Gender
Male
242 (63)
73 (52)
Female
139 (36)
67 (48)
0.02
Primary tumor site
Prostate
96 (25)
29 (21)
Breast
38 (10)
24 (17)
Lung (small cell)
23 (6)
7 (5)
Lung (non-small cell)
70 (18)
21 (15)
Colorectal
24 (6)
11 (8)
Kidney
23 (6)
8 (6)
Bladder
25 (7)
5 (4)
Malignant melanoma
12 (3)
2 (1)
Other
71 (19)
33 (24)
0.39
Incomplete RTb
No
341 (96)
114 (94)
Yes
16 (4)
7 (6)
0.63
Total number of TV in RT course
1
272 (71)
81 (58)
2
90 (24)
46 (33)
3
20 (5)
13 (9)
0.01
Number of RT fractions
Single
41 (11)
19 (14)
2–10
249 (65)
92 (66)
>10
92 (24)
29 (21)
0.46
Dose per fraction (Gy)
<3
44 (12)
13 (9)
3
190 (50)
64 (46)
>3
148 (39)
63 (45)
0.41
Selected target types
Bone metastases
240 (63)
95 (68)
0.35
Brain metastases
58 (15)
29 (21)
0.15
Known liver metastasesa
No
311 (81)
103 (74)
Yes
69 (18)
37 (26)
0.049
Known lung metastasesa
No
304
108
Yes
76
32
0.47
Known adrenal gland metastasesa
No
346
127
Yes
34
13
0.87
Metastatic diseasea
No
51 (13)
13 (9)
Yes
303 (79)
116 (83)
0.23
Progressive disease outside TVa
No
147 (38)
48 (34)
Yes
225 (59)
86 (61)
0.47
Hemoglobin before RTa
Low
230 (60)
97 (69)
Normal
116 (30)
39 (28)
0.33
Steroids during RTa,c
No
183 (48)
48 (34)
Yes
141 (37)
80 (57)
0.0001
Analgeticsa,c
No opioids
158 (41)
34 (24)
Oral/transdermal opioids
174 (46)
80 (57)
Continuous opioids (pump)
6 (2)
15 (11)
0.0001
Systemic cancer treatmenta
No
186 (49)
48 (34)
Before RT
173 (45)
80 (57)
0.006
RT: radiotherapy, TV: target volume. aMissing information in some cases; bexcluding single fraction RT, which was always completed; cinformation collected from patient charts rather than pharmacy databases.
