Compliance to Multimodality Management in Locally Advanced Head and Neck Malignancies

Abstract

Background: Head and Neck cancer is the 8th most common cancer globally and the 3rd most common in India. It includes cancers of the oral cavity, oropharynx, nasopharynx, larynx, hypopharynx, paranasal sinuses, salivary glands and the ear.
Most cases are managed by more than one approach like surgery radiotherapy or chemotherapy. The particularly long regimen of multimodality management may present many factors that affect patient compliance. Attempts at studying such factors can go a long way in ensuring completion of the treatment plan for curative or palliative intent, reducing recurrence and improving quality of life of the patients.
Objectives: To study compliance to multimodality management in locally advanced head & neck malignancies and to determine the association with various factors
Methodology: This is a cross-sectional study to determine the compliance to multimodality management of locally advanced head and neck malignancies. The study subjects were persons diagnosed with locally advanced head and neck malignancies, who have been receiving more than one modality of cancer management which may include surgery, chemotherapy or radiotherapy from our institution between January 2022 to December 2022.The subjects who satisfied the inclusion criteria based on the cancer-patient records were interviewed with a semi structured format via telephone. The significance of all variables was calculated using chi-square analysis
Results: This study determined the overall noncompliance among patients of locally advanced head and neck malignancies to be 20%
The only factor that was found to have a significant association with noncompliance was lack of confidence in the treatment regimen. {P=0.0279}
Conclusion: A statistically significant association was observed between noncompliance and lack of confidence in treatment regimen.