Fertility and Temporality in Pediatric Oncology

Background: When a cancer is diagnosed in a child, the urgency is to take therapeutic actions. Children and their families face the reality of cancer and the reality of the treatments that, in addition to be overwhelming, might cause infertility. Immediately after the diagnosis, a fertility preservation consultation is proposed to discuss fertility preservation options. In practice, it is often difficult to organize.

Several years after the end of treatments, a second information consultation is proposed to inform about fertility, evaluate the fertility status and propose a second line of Fertility Preservation when possible. The literature reflects a lack of knowledge regarding the degree of fertility-related distress among pediatric cancer patients as well as insufficient tools at the disposal of medical doctors and nurses to discuss about reproduction with children and young adolescents.

Project objective: Understand how young cancer patients and their parents felt about sterility risk at the diagnostic time and now as cured adolescents.

Patients & Methods:

300 patients (15-25 years) from 5 different centers (20 patients per year and per center for 3 years) will be included in this study at the information consultation. They will be surveyed through self-administered questionnaires and semidirected interviews that will 1) retrieve perceptions and emotional being of children during the fertility preservation consultation; 2) assess the decision-making process of parents and family since the fertility preservation consultation through the patient's speech; 3) interview the patients about personal history and experience of cancer and consequences of potential fertility impairment and 4) survey the current experience and projections in the future and evaluate their reaction to the proposition of a second line of Fertility Preservation.

Expected results: what points should the doctor / psychologist discuss with pediatric cancer survivors in response to their fertility stress? and how to do it? for better initial and follow-up care to improve their quality of life after cancer.