Lyons Phoebe, Kennedy Alison, Clover A James P
Department of Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery, Cork University Hospital, Cork, Ireland.
Cancer Research @ UCC, Western Gateway Building, University College Cork, Ireland.
JPRAS Open. 2020 Dec 25;27:119-128. doi: 10.1016/j.jpra.2020.12.004. eCollection 2021 Mar.
The establishment and success of new treatments are significantly influenced by patient satisfaction. Post-operative scarring is an important outcome for patients, and subsequently influences overall satisfaction with treatment. The objective was to measure post-treatment scarring satisfaction using a novel scale, the FACE-Q Skin Cancer Module, to compare electrochemotherapy (ECT) to traditional surgical excision (SE) to demonstrate equivalence of ECT and SE regarding outcome and survivorship.
This was a multicentre first-time appraisal study of the efficacy of ECT. All patients with facial BCCs treated with either ECT or SE were deemed eligible and subsequently recruited from either a previous clinical trial or outpatient clinics, respectively. Of the 40 participants invited, 25 responses were received. Patient information recorded included age, gender, location and size of BCCs, and time since treatment. Patient outcomes were measured using the FACE-Q Skin Cancer Module.
The ECT and SE groups consisted of 14 and 11 patients, respectively. Mean age was 68 years (M: = 16:9), while mean time since treatment was 4.98 years (range 0.3-9.58 years). Appraisal of scars was significantly higher in the ECT cohort versus SE ( = 0.034). Cancer worry was equivalent across both cohorts ( = 0.804). According to treatment type, no correlation was detected between time since treatment and both appraisal of scars (ECT = 0.466 and SE = 0.214) and adverse effects (ECT = 0.924 and SE = 0.139).
Based on this study, ECT has superior scar outcomes and overall equivalence to SE. This demonstrates high patient satisfaction for those treated with ECT without any additional cancer worry.
新治疗方法的建立与成功受到患者满意度的显著影响。术后瘢痕形成是患者的一项重要结果，进而影响对治疗的总体满意度。目的是使用一种新颖的量表——面部皮肤癌问卷模块（FACE-Q Skin Cancer Module）来衡量治疗后瘢痕形成的满意度，比较电化学疗法（ECT）与传统手术切除（SE），以证明ECT和SE在结果与生存率方面的等效性。
这是一项关于ECT疗效的多中心首次评估研究。所有接受ECT或SE治疗的面部基底细胞癌（BCC）患者均被视为符合条件，随后分别从前一项临床试验或门诊招募。在邀请的40名参与者中，收到了25份回复。记录的患者信息包括年龄、性别、BCC的位置和大小以及治疗后的时间。使用面部皮肤癌问卷模块来测量患者的结果。
ECT组和SE组分别有14名和11名患者。平均年龄为68岁（中位数=16:9），而平均治疗后时间为4.98年（范围0.3 - 9.58年）。ECT队列对瘢痕的评估明显高于SE组（P = 0.034）。两组患者的癌症担忧程度相当（P = 0.804）。根据治疗类型，未检测到治疗后时间与瘢痕评估（ECT组P = 0.466，SE组P = 0.214）以及不良反应（ECT组P = 0.924，SE组P = 0.139）之间存在相关性。
基于本研究，ECT在瘢痕结果方面具有优势，且与SE总体等效。这表明接受ECT治疗的患者满意度较高，且没有额外的癌症担忧。
