Gene/Protein Disease Symptom Drug Enzyme Compound
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Query: UMLS:C0015672 (fatigue)
 51,768 document(s) hit in 31,850,051 MEDLINE articles (0.00 seconds)

Anemia is the most common hematological abnormality in cancer patients, unfortunately, it is often under-recognized and under-treated. The pathogenesis of cancer anemia is complex and most of the time multifactorial; involving factors related to the tumor itself or its therapy. While anemia can present in a wide range of symptoms, involving almost every organ, it is believed that it contributes much to cancer-related fatigue, one of the most common symptoms in cancer patients. In addition, there is increasing evidence to suggest that anemia is an independent factor adversely affecting tumor response and patient survival. While blood transfusion was the only option to treat cancer-related anemia, the use of recombinant human erythropoietin (rHuEPO) is becoming the new standard of care, more so with the recent studies demonstrating the feasibility of a single weekly injection. Things are even getting better with the recent approval of a new form of rHuEPO; Darbepoetin, an analogue with a 3-fold longer half-life. In addition to its effect in raising hemoglobin, several well-controlled studies demonstrated decrease in transfusion requirements and better quality of life assessed objectively using standard assessments scales.
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PMID:Cancer-related anemia. 1475 72

Anaemia is the most common haematological abnormality encountered by cancer patients. A large European survey of cancer patients (n = 15,367) reported that 67% had anaemia at some point during the survey, and that over 60% of these patients did not receive any treatment for their anaemia. Two other surveys (the FATIGUE surveys) showed that over 75% of cancer patients experienced fatigue at least monthly, with over 30% reporting this symptom on a daily basis. Significantly, patients regarded fatigue as having a greater negative impact on their daily lives than many other cancer- or treatment-related complications, with important emotional and mental consequences including lack of self-motivation, sadness, frustration, and mental exhaustion. Indeed, fatigue was considered so debilitating, 12% of patients felt their quality of life (QoL) was so reduced that they did not wish to continue living. Anaemia is also recognised as an independent predictor of poor prognosis in cancer patients. A systematic review evaluating survival showed a 65% overall increase in the risk of mortality in cancer patients with anaemia. Increasing physicians' awareness of the importance of effectively treating anaemia in cancer patients therefore has the potential to improve prognosis as well as QoL.
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PMID:Anaemia of cancer: impact on patient fatigue and long-term outcome. 1624 4