Cost, quality of life and outcome measures in ovarian cancer

As research into cancer intensifies and treatments proliferate, life-interv al gained is no longer a question of simply measuring time. Ovarian cancer patients, especially, have benefited from efforts to develop feasible scree ning processes and the new treatment modalities for this type of cancer. Wi thin the last decade, medicine has come to realize that survival intervals and cure rates are useless to patients if they cannot retrieve out of the p rocess at least some aspects of their lives before cancer and for as long a period of time as possible. This article focuses on measuring and assessin g the effects of treatment in terms of outcome and quality of life from the patient's perspective. Medicine as a science, and being a science, has not been comfortable in taking into account intangibles when assessing its own performance and success rates. However, the roles of caregivers and hearth providers have been rapidly evolving from that of treating the disease to treating the patient, and often the patient's family, with all that implies . [(C) 1998 Lippincott Williams & Wilkins.].