Use of a depression treatment program does not improve survival in patients with cancer and comorbid major depression, even though it was highly effective in reducing depressive symptoms, UK researchers report.

In the monotherapy arm, there was one grade 3–5 TRAE each of increased lipase, rash, colitis, hyperlipasemia, and macular rash, while in the combination group there were two cases of hypertension and one case each of increased lipase, dyspnea, back pain, depression, fatigue, musculoskeletal pain, and pneumonitis.  

Patients with breast cancer may be at increased risk for early discontinuation of adjuvant endocrine therapy if they have depression, or poor physical or social wellbeing before treatment initiation, suggests a post-hoc analysis of the TAILORx trial.

He described high levels of anxiety, distress, and depression in 58.4%, 55.0%, and 44.5%, of patients, respectively.

Significantly more patients with versus without cancer were “quite a bit/very much” worried about acquiring SARS-CoV-2 infection (22.4 vs 17.9%), but there were no significant differences between the groups with regard to global quality of life, pain, or depression.

Women with breast cancer had higher than normal levels of severe anxiety, depression, distress, and insomnia at the peak of the COVID-19 outbreak in the Hubei Province in China, study findings indicate.

After adjusting for demographic and clinical covariates, the researchers found that first disease progression was associated with a statistically significant worsening of 37 of the 45 HRQoL scales of the EORTC QLQ-C15 PAL (pancreatic cancer), EORTC QLQ-C30 (lung and colorectal cancer), Functional Assessment of Cancer Therapy–General (breast cancer), and Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale (breast cancer) questionnaires.

These included bowel, urinary, sexual, and hormonal domains as measured using the Expanded Prostate Cancer Index Composite (EPIC) questionnaire, anxiety and depression on the 25-item Hopkins Symptom Checklist, and global QoL using the EuroQol-5 Dimensions questionnaire.

Sanson-Fisher R et al. Support Care Cancer 2019; 27: 763. doi:10.1007/s00520-018-4568-4

Beesley VL et al. Support Care Cancer 2018; 26: 4133. doi:10.1007/s00520-018-4284-0

Secondary outcomes, including the effects on anxiety, depression, distress, and quality of life, were also comparable between study arms, report Marie Fallon, from the University of Edinburgh, and fellow investigators in a research letter in JAMA Oncology .

Furthermore, obese patients are at increased risk of depression, anxiety, and decreased quality of life.

Test scores were converted into age-corrected z scores, and models were adjusted for baseline performance, age, education, and depression.

Basch said that people with anxiety showed an improvement as they participated in the program, but observed “that may be more because their provider becomes aware of their anxiety and depression and intervenes to treat that.”

In addition, patients with low testosterone were more likely than those without to have high cholesterol (20 vs 6%), hypertension (19 vs 11%), erectile dysfunction (20 vs 12%), diabetes (6 vs 3%), and anxiety or depression (15 vs 10%).

CALM also reduced the risk for developing depression – of the 137 participants who were not depressed at intake, 13% of those in the intervention arm developed depressive symptoms compared with 30% of control participants.

Nevertheless, they note that earlier suggestions of patient concerns about TFR did not translate to an increased risk of anxiety or depression.