Fatigue after breast cancer radiotherapy: Who’s most at risk?

Topline

Many patients with breast cancer who receive radiotherapy can still experience fatigue years after treatment; risk factors, including pain, insomnia, depression, baseline fatigue, and endocrine therapy were associated with long-term fatigue, new data show.

Methodology

• Overall, 1,443 patients with breast cancer from the REQUITE study responded to the Multidimensional Fatigue Inventory 20 (MFI-20) tool to assess five dimensions of fatigue: general, physical, and mental fatigue as well as reduced activity and motivation.
• Patients from France, Spain, Germany, Italy, the United Kingdom, and United States were assessed for characteristics, including age, body mass index (BMI), smoking, depression, pain, insomnia, fatigue, and therapy type, at baseline and at 24 months.
• Investigators identified factors associated with fatigue at 2 years post-radiotherapy among a total of 664 patients without chemotherapy and 324 with chemotherapy.
• General fatigue trajectories were classified as low, moderate, high, or decreasing.

Takeaways

• In general, levels of fatigue increased significantly from baseline to the end of radiotherapy for all fatigue dimensions (P < .05) and returned close to baseline levels after 1-2 years.
• About 24% of patients had high general fatigue trajectories and 25% had moderate, while 46% had low and 5% had decreasing fatigue trajectories.
• Factors such as age, BMI, global health status, insomnia, pain, dyspnea, depression, and baseline fatigue were each associated with multiple fatigue dimensions at 2 years; for instance, fatigue at baseline was associated with all five MFI-20 dimensions at 2 years regardless of chemotherapy status.
• Those with a combination of factors such as pain, insomnia, depression, younger age, and endocrine therapy were especially likely to develop high fatigue early and have it persist years after treatment.

In practice

“Our results confirmed the multidimensional nature of fatigue and will help clinicians identify breast cancer patients at higher risk of having persistent/late fatigue so that tailored interventions can be delivered,” the authors concluded.

Source

The study was led by Juan C. Rosas, with the German Cancer Research Center, Heidelberg. It was published online July 5 in the International Journal of Cancer.

Limitations

About one-quarter of patients did not complete the 2-year follow-up. Some variables identified in the literature as possible fatigue predictors such as socioeconomic status, physical activity, and social support were not included.

Disclosures

The study had no commercial funding. The authors reported no relevant financial relationships.

A version of this article appeared on Medscape.com.