The European Palliative Care Cancer Symptom Study (EPCCS)

Summary

The rising incidence of cancer and the rapidly increasing number of people living longer with incurable disease, accentuates the need for optimal symptom management throughout the disease trajectory. Thanks to the medical and technological development, and the increased interest in palliative care research, palliative medicine has gradually become more evidence based. Patients with advanced cancer experience multiple symptoms at the time with fluctuating intensity and severity. Pain, fatigue, nausea/vomiting, dyspnea, loss of appetite and depression are among the most common and experienced by more than 50%. However, the prevalence rates of these symptoms vary considerably across studies, with a range from 35 to 90 % for pain as an example. These differences may in part be explained by different assessment tools, study methods and design and population characteristics. There is also lack of agreed-upon, common criteria to describe the main characteristics of a palliative care cancer population and few standardized tools for assessment and classification of symptoms exist. These shortcomings limit the possibility to design randomized controlled treatment trials in palliative care; the optimal way to improve clinical symptom management. To do this, a better understanding of how symptoms evolve and how they should be assessed and classified throughout the palliative care disease trajectory is important, supplemented with registrations of the treatment provided. The primary aim of this international research project the European Palliative Care Cancer Symptom study (EPCCS) is to extend the knowledge about and gain new insight in the prevalence and development of the most frequent cancer related symptoms during the course of disease, in a large sample of palliative care cancer patients. The clinical usefulness of the new assessment and classification system developed by the European Palliative Care Research Collaborative (EPCRC) / European Association for Palliative Care Research Network (EAPC RN) will be examined and data on the organization and delivery of palliative care at participating centers will be collected. The project also aims to further develop and consolidate international research collaboration through the European Palliative Care Research Centre (PRC). Taken together, these efforts will increase the understanding of the palliative disease trajectory and provide necessary knowledge and structure for future randomized controlled trials (RCTs)

Conditions

• Cancer

Sponsors & Collaborators

• Norwegian University of Science and Technology

  lead OTHER

• Rigshospitalet, Denmark

  collaborator OTHER

• Oslo University Hospital

  collaborator OTHER

• Medical University of Graz

  collaborator OTHER

• University of Navarra

  collaborator OTHER

• Hospital Universitario La Paz

  collaborator OTHER

• Cantonal Hospital of St. Gallen

  collaborator OTHER

• Institut Català d'Oncologia

  collaborator OTHER

• University of Alberta

  collaborator OTHER

• Flinders University

  collaborator OTHER

• University Hospital, Ghent

  collaborator OTHER

• The Cleveland Clinic

  collaborator OTHER

• Hospital de San Lázaro

  collaborator UNKNOWN

• Haukeland University Hospital

  collaborator OTHER

• Kantonsspital Graubünden

  collaborator OTHER

• Fondazione IRCCS Istituto Nazionale dei Tumori, Milano

  collaborator OTHER

• University of Edinburgh

  collaborator OTHER

• Leeds Cancer Centre at St. James

  collaborator UNKNOWN

• Turku University Hospital

  collaborator OTHER_GOV

• St George's, University of London

  collaborator OTHER

Principal Investigators

• Stein Kaasa, Prof MD · Norwegian University of Science and Technology

• Marianne J Hjermstad, PhD · Norwegian University of Science and Technology

Eligibility

Min Age

18 Years

Sex

ALL

Healthy Volunteers

No

Timeline & Regulatory

Start

2011-06-30

Primary Completion

2013-10-31

Completion

2013-10-31

Countries

• Norway

Study Locations