Patient responses to bowel disease
Research looks at factors which inform patient preferences for different treatment outcomes.
Bowel cancer, also known as colorectal cancer, refers to cancer which starts in the large bowel (colon) and the back passage (rectum). Colorectal cancer is currently the third most common cancer and second leading cause of cancer death worldwide. Surgery and radiotherapy can reduce the chance of rectal cancer recurring, however both treatments can adversely affect a person’s bowel function and poor bowel function may result in the need for a permanent stoma- where medical intervention leads to a patient’s bowel movement occurring from an opening in the abdomen connecting the bowel to an external pouch.
What we’re researching:
Professor Anne Miles, Department of Psychological Sciences and a team are examining factors which are most important to people in making a decision on the rectal cancer treatments available to them: Reducing their risk of recurrence, avoiding a permanent stoma and/or having good bowel function. Additionally, the research will also be able to see what level of poor bowel function people will put up with in order to avoid needing a permanent stoma and whether this varies by age, gender or disease stage at diagnosis.
The research team have interviewed rectal cancer patients about what was important to them when making decisions about their cancer treatment and are currently sending questionnaires to patients to assess which factors influence their treatment preferences and any treatment-related regret.
Increasing numbers of people are surviving colorectal cancer, and greater attention is now paid to the challenges that cancer survivors face following treatment for a life-threatening condition. One quarter of people diagnosed with colorectal cancer will have rectal cancer and may be offered surgery and/ or radiotherapy, with up to a quarter of patients requiring a permanent stoma.
The potential benefits of both surgery and radiotherapy are the associated reductions in the risk of recurrence. However, both surgery and radiotherapy can cause bowel incontinence, and increase the likelihood of patients requiring a permanent stoma. Current National Institute for Health and Care Institute (NICE) guidance states that patients with medium level risk of recurrence should be considered for pre-operative radiotherapy while surgery only should be offered to low risk of recurrence patients.
However, there is evidence of decisional regret among prostate cancer patients following surgery because of the impact of such treatment on sexual and urinary function and rectal cancer survivors may express similar levels of regret following treatment for their cancer.
Fully informing patients of the likelihood of problems following different treatments is therefore important in reducing post-treatment regret and knowing what level of bowel function patients will tolerate in exchange for reducing their risk of recurrence following different treatments is also critical to enabling patients to make decisions about their treatment.
What the impact will be:
The research will help inform health care professionals about the factors patients find important in making decisions about their treatment. This project will answer the question “What level of poor function is justified to avoid a permanent stoma?” from the perspective of people with rectal cancer. This research will form the basis of future research into providing information to help patients make informed decisions about their treatment for rectal cancer.
Project Fact-File:
-
Full project title: “The role of risk of recurrence, bowel function and avoidance of a permanent stoma in patient preferences for treatment for rectal cancer”
-
Project funding: £58,142
-
Funder: Bowel Disease Research Foundation
-
Length of award: 1 July 2019 to 25 June 2022
-
People
Principal Investigator: Professor Anne Miles; Co-investigators: Professor Robert Steele, Professor Steve Morris, Grieg Stanners