Long-term Effects Following Treatment of Women With Screen-detected Versus Symptomatic Breast Cancer

The project will include a retrospective information which will be collected by using a self-administered questionnaire about the treatment women received and their quality of life at certain time points after a breast cancer diagnosis. Women aged 50-69 years at the time of diagnosis are the target group of BreastScreen Norway and also for this project.

The women will be identified from the Cancer Registry databases. The questionnaire will be based on EQ-5D-5L and will be developed in close collaboration with breast cancer survivors who have personally experienced the long-term effects of breast cancer treatment, whether resulting from screen-detected or symptomatic breast cancer.

The questionnaire will cover topics related to demographics, treatment, and information required to estimate health related quality of life (HRQoL) and quality-adjusted life years (QALY). Information about detection mode and disease stage at diagnosis will be extracted from the Cancer Registry.

Study I - a review of the literature in a paper describing and analyzing the current evidence on quality of life among women diagnosed with breast cancer and treated for this disease, with a focus on disease stage at diagnosis. Due to substantial changes in treatment during the last decades, only studies reporting on women who have received treatment in 1995 or later will be included. Solely studies written in English will be included.

For studies II and III, data collected from the self-administered questionnaire will be used. In addition, information about screening history and tumor characteristics will be obtained from the Cancer Registry of Norway.