Edmonton Symptom Assessment Scale (ESAS) For Routine Symptom Assessment of Non-Advanced Patients with Solid or Haematological Malignancies on Oncological Therapies

ABSTRACT The Edmonton Symptom Assessment Scale (ESAS) was developed for use in daily symptom assessment of palliative care patients. We used the ESAS validated version in Italian Language to assess the presence and intensity of symptoms (not at all = 0; mild 1-4, not controlled ≥5) in 108 patients with solid and 86 with haematologic malignancies and no metastases, on active oncological treatments (156 patients) or during follow-up. In haematologic group, dyspnoea was ≥ 5 in 12% of the patients in respect to 3% of solid tumour group (chi2 test, p = 0.002). Not controlled fatigue, drowsiness and dyspnoea were significantly more frequent in patients on cure (p = 0.041; p = 0.026; p = 0.010 respectively). The intensity of all the symptoms was higher in patients with a KPS of 70-90 in respect to those with KPS > 90, and in patients above the clinical HADS cutoff (10/11) in respect to those below. The intensity of psychological suffering was higher for patients who requested psychological support. The correlation (rho of Pearson) between the anxiety and depression items of ESAS with HADs was >.5, whereas the feeling of well- being in ESAS inversely strongly correlated with all the other ESAS symptoms (rho > .4); anorexia with nausea and drowsiness; drowsiness with fatigue; and anxiety with depression. As the ESAS assesses the most frequent symptoms referred to by the patients during oncological treatments, its administration to the patients in the routine practice before each visit with the oncologist can give him/her the information on the presence and intensity of physical and emotional symptoms. Disclosure All authors have declared no conflicts of interest.