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Patient-reported outcomes in metastatic castration-resistant prostate cancer

Nature Reviews Clinical Oncology volume 13, pages 643–650 (2016)Cite this article

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Abstract

Many novel therapies are available for use in patients with metastatic castration-resistant prostate cancer (mCRPC), some of which convey substantial progression-free survival and overall survival benefits. Delaying disease progression and providing palliation of symptoms are primary therapeutic aims of treating patients with mCRPC; therefore, ensuring that the benefit-to-harm ratios are acceptable to patients, through systematic measurement of patient-reported outcomes (PROs) using validated tools, is vital. In this Perspectives, we appraised the published reports from clinical trials testing treatments of mCRPC over the past 5 years and found that PROs were either not being measured routinely, or if used, were often not reported adequately, thus hampering evaluation of the true effects of many of these treatments on patients' quality of life. Improvements are needed because data collected directly from patients, not just physician-collected safety data and adverse events, are crucial to inform clinical decision-making on treatment options.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Lesley J. Fallowfield and Valerie Jenkins are at the Sussex Health Outcomes Research & Education in Cancer (SHORE-C), Brighton & Sussex Medical School, University of Sussex, Falmer, East Sussex BN1 9RX, UK.,

    Lesley Fallowfield & Valerie Jenkins

  2. Heather Payne is at the Department of Oncology, University College Hospital, 235 Euston Road, London NW1 2BU, UK.,

    Heather Payne

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  1. Lesley Fallowfield
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Contributions

V.J. and L.F. researched data for this article, all authors made a substantial contribution to discussions of content, V.J. and L.F. wrote the manuscript and all authors made a substantial contribution to reviewing and/or editing the manuscript prior to submission.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Lesley Fallowfield.

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Competing interests

L.F. has acted as a consultant for and received honoraria from Amgen, Astellas and Sanofi. The other authors declare no competing interests.

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Fallowfield, L., Payne, H. & Jenkins, V. Patient-reported outcomes in metastatic castration-resistant prostate cancer. Nat Rev Clin Oncol 13, 643–650 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1038/nrclinonc.2016.100

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