Systematic review and meta‐analysis of health‐related quality of life in pediatric CNS tumor survivors

Abstract

Pediatric CNS tumor survivors experience worse HRQOL than healthy comparisons and non-CNS cancer survivors. Future HRQOL work should be longitudinal, and/or multisite studies that examine HRQOL by diagnosis and treatment modalities.

A systematic review of factors related to children's quality of life and mental health after brain tumor

“…It is well established that pediatric brain tumor has detrimental effects on children's QOL . Extending upon this literature, this review aimed to determine the factors associated with children's SWB or QOL and mental health in the context of brain tumor.…”

“…Searches were limited to peer‐reviewed articles published in English involving pediatric populations. Additionally, backward and forward reference searching was conducted on eligible articles and relevant reviews . After removing duplicates, the first author screened the titles and abstracts of articles identified for potential inclusion.…”

“…A meta‐analysis by Schulte et al compared QOL of children diagnosed with CNS tumor before age 21 to healthy controls and pediatric non‐CNS cancer groups. Central nervous system tumor survivors had significantly poorer QOL than both healthy controls and non‐CNS survivors.…”

“…Overall, there is a paucity of research on factors related to children's self‐reported mental health and QOL following brain tumor . While parent‐proxy reports may be necessary in situations where children cannot participate in research due to acute morbidity and severe neurocognitive and language impairments, child inclusive research that seeks to understand children's perceptions of their own well‐being has been strongly advocated .…”

“…While parent‐proxy reports may be necessary in situations where children cannot participate in research due to acute morbidity and severe neurocognitive and language impairments, child inclusive research that seeks to understand children's perceptions of their own well‐being has been strongly advocated . Studies have shown that parents of children with cancer often report more severe illness burden than perceived by their children . Qualitative research suggests that children with brain tumor are able to express the everyday effects of their illness .…”