Financial Distress in Patients With Advanced Cancer

Advanced cancer has an adverse effect in virtually all dimensions of patients' lives (physical, psychosocial, spiritual, familial, role function). One of the less frequently explored effects of cancer is its impact on personal finances and the contribution of financial-related distress to overall suffering and quality of life. Financial issues have been recently found to be the second most frequent source of distress identified by cancer patients in a community cancer center context (22%).

In the context of continuous increased health care costs, it is likely that the frequency of health care related financial problems will keep rising. The relative contribution of these adverse financial events in advanced cancer patients to overall patient distress is not well assessed and this is particularly true in France. The main objective of this work is to determine the association between financial distress and quality of life of patients with advanced cancer in a Public General Hospital and in a Comprehensive Cancer Center. A secondary objective is to characterize the frequency and intensity of financial distress reported by French cancer patients and their impact on their quality of life.