Tradeoffs of Life: between Quality and Quantity Development of the QQ Questionnaire for Cancer Patient Attitudes

The patient's perspective is of prime concern in weighing the benefits and side effects of oncologic treatment. Little is known about patients' preference and attitudes. The authors developed a short questionnaire to assess patient attitudes concerning trade-offs between quality of life and length, or quantity, of life (the QQ Questionnaire). The questionnaire turned out to be feasible for use in various groups of cancer patients. In a factor analysis, the questionnaire was shown to consist of two factors, a Q(uality) and a L(ength) factor. Values of Cronbach's alpha for the Q and L scales (consisting of four items each) were 0.68 and 0.79, respectively. Younger patients and patients who have children assigned relatively more importance to striving for prolonged survival. Contrary to our expectation, no association was found between scores on the two scales and time tradeoff utility scores. The QQ Questionnaire can be used in research settings to study patient attitudes and the stability and determinants of patients' preference

Through the Clock's Workings

A world first! The first remixed and remixable anthology of literature. This anthology of short stories is not some textual tome, frozen in time and space. It is alive, evolving organically in a constant state of flux. Why? Because each story is available under a Creative Commons licence, giving you rights to share and reuse the book as you see fit. So how do you use a remixable anthology? Simple. Step 1 - Read. Thumb your way through the pages at will. Find the stories you love, the ones you hate, the ones that could be better. Step 2 - Re/create. Each story is yours to share and to remix. Use only one paragraph or character or just make subtle changes. Change the genre, alter its formal or stylistic characteristics, or revise its message. Use as little or as much as you like - as long as it works. Step 3 - Share. Be part of a growing community of literature remixing. Post your remixes to the Remix My Lit website, remixmylit.com, and start sharing. The entire anthology can be remixed - the original stories, the remixes, and even the fonts. Through the Clock's Workings is Read&Write

Screening for psychological distress before radiotherapy for painful bone metastases may be useful to identify patients with high levels of distress

Biological, physical and clinical aspects of cancer treatment with ionising radiatio

Honderd jaar radiologie in Nederland, IV : radiotherapie, huidige stand van zaken

Contains fulltext : 20984___.PDF (publisher's version ) (Open Access

Infrastructure of radiotherapy in the Netherlands: evaluation of prognoses and introduction of a new model for determining the needs.

Item does not contain fulltextBACKGROUND AND PURPOSE: In the Netherlands, the radiotherapy infrastructure is regulated by a Governmental license system. This requires timely and realistic prognostication of the needs for radiotherapy. In the present study, the latest prognoses (1993) and the realized changes in infrastructure are evaluated and a new prognosis for the period until 2010, which has been calculated using a new model, is presented. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Data on cancer incidence and use of radiotherapy were obtained from various published national reports and from a survey of all radiotherapy departments. RESULTS: The cancer incidence over the period 1993-1997 was about 10% higher than predicted. In 1996 and 1997, the percentage of new cancer patients treated with radiotherapy was 45.6 and 48.2%, respectively. The absolute number of newly irradiated patients was about 10% higher than foreseen in the prognosis. The needs for radiotherapy infrastructure not only depend on epidemiological data and changes in indications for radiotherapy, but also on changes in types of treatment with different workloads. A new model, which uses four categories for teletherapy and four categories for brachytherapy is described and a new prognosis for the required number of linear accelerators and staff up to the year 2010 is presented. CONCLUSION: The original prognosis on cancer incidence and radiotherapy patients underestimated the actual figures considerably. The new prognosis, based on a model, which not only accounts for an increase in number of patients, but also for changes in treatment techniques, is expected to more accurately predict and acquire the required radiotherapy capacity

Positionering van de radiotherapie binnen de oncologie

Contains fulltext : 24677___.PDF (publisher's version ) (Open Access