The Effect of Informing Children Diagnosed with Acute Lymphoblastic Leukaemia and Their Families About the Disease and Its Treatment on Quality of Life

Objective: This quasi experimental study was conducted to examine the effect of information about planned chemotherapy on the characteristics of their quality of life (QoL) given to children with Acute Lymphoblastic Leukaemia (ALL). Material and Methods: Fourty seven children and their parents, who were already receiving chemotherapy in Selcuk University, Meram Faculty of Medicine, Paediatric Haematology-Oncology Clinic, and the applicants came for follow-up between the March 01(st) and April 30(th) 2005, have constituted the main set of samples of this research. The children and families were asked to complete a data collection form about their descriptive characteristics and the Kindl R quality of life tests were applied thereafter. They were given information about chemotherapy as they came to the polyclinic for medical controls, one day every week during one month of period. At the end of this period, the second scale application was performed during their next month's appointments, where a "chemotherapy information booklet" was also introduced to the families. During the data analysis, paired-sample test was used for determining the average values and percentages, one-way ANOVA test was applied when there were three or more parameters, and the Tukey test was used for advanced analysis. The analyses were conducted on a computer using SPSS 11.5 statistics program. Results: The life quality scores after information reported by both the children (t4-7= 19.640 p< 0.05, t8-12= 25.853 p< 0.05) and their families (t4-7= 12.762 p< 0.05, t8-12= 19.016 p< 0.05) were found to be increased comparing to that before information. An increase in the area of self respect was achieved for every age group informed about chemotherapy. Conclusion: It can be concluded that the information about chemoteraphy, and related training programmes for the children with ALL and their families, would improve their life qualities.