Oral Complications and Their Management in Patients With Cancer During Chemo or Radiotherapy in Bangladesh

Abstract

Cancer is a very alarming disease that affects many people in every year all over the world and also in Bangladesh. Under this study a descriptive cross-sectional study was conducted to assess the knowledge on oral health status and its care before, during and after therapy. Total 145 cancer patients were selected and interviewed through a semi-structured questionnaire. Out of them 82 female and male 63 where 56 patients were treated by radiotherapy (38.62%), 72 patients were treated only by chemotherapy (49.66%) and 17 patients received both radio and chemotherapy. Here 80.69% of patients having pain during therapy while 28.96% and 11.03% before therapy. On the other hand, 61.38% patients had a change of taste after therapy whereas 8.96% had a change of taste during therapy. It was observed that the both physical and psychological well-being of oral health on quality of life which had a high effect on physical pain where 30.34% was very high, 46.21% was moderate, 20.69% a little and 2.76% not at all. In the psychological well-being study 62.76% patients felt very depressed where 37.24% fear moderate type of functional disability and 34.48% feel very lonely of remote from other people. Most patients developed sensitivity, altered taste, oral thrush, mucositis, trismus and xerostemia during and after palliative treatment. Poor knowledge (70.6%) was observed among patients in recommended quality of tooth brush, frequency of tooth brushing, duration, motion and recommended diet. Most of the patients (29.4%) were found with low quality of life. The study also concluded that patients should be provided with adequate knowledge about oral care before taking chemotherapy or radiotherapy.

J Bio-Sci. 30(1): 49-59, 2022 (June)