6. Potential Effectiveness
Anxiety, cancer, long-term cancer, FAI, Fatigue
CANCER, SECONDARY
A secondary aim of this study was to examine changes in physical and psychological outcome measures as an indicator of the potential effectiveness of OptiMal in improving the physical and psychological health of cancer survivors. The results indicate that participation in OptiMal significantly improved psychological health and quality of life three months following completion of the intervention. Although participation in daily activities showed greater improvement for the intervention participants, there was no statistically significant difference between the two groups. However, as this was a feasibility study, the sample size was not powered to test for statistical significance.Anxiety and distress are reported as frequent outcomes of a cancer diagnosis and cancer treatment [A study of HRQOL in long-term cancer survivors reported that reduced quality of life can persist for up to 10 years following cancer treatment [Although the intervention group had greater improvements in participation in daily activity, this difference was not statistically significant. Based on baseline FAI scores, both groups appeared to have relatively high levels of activity participation at the start of the study, and therefore, the lack of a significant improvement could be related to the timing of intervention delivery. The majority of participants in the current study were one-year post-cancer treatment and may have already returned to pre-treatment activity levels prior to participating in OptiMal. Fleischer and Howell [Fatigue is a persistent symptom for cancer survivors which impacts considerably on activity participation [