The effect of exercise on the severity of the fatigue in colorectal cancer patients who received chemotherapy in Ahwaz

Abstract

BACKGROUND: Cancer is a disease which is identified by abnormal deformation of the cells. One of the common side effects of the cancer is fatigue that affects on patients’ life quality and leads to disability. Exercise has an important role in improving these patients’ life quality and can be used as a complementary treatment during and after the cancer treatment. Unfortunately, despite good effects of exercise, most people afflicted from cancer have few or no exercise on their life. Moreover, there are few studies on the impact of exercise on fatigue among patients with colon cancer while most studies have focused on breast cancer.

Therefore, the present study investigated the effects of exercise on the severity of fatigue in patients with colorectal cancer who underwent chemotherapy in Ahwaz.

METHODS: This is a Quasi- experiment study. The study population consisted of adults with Colorectal Cancer. The sample included 36 people. The study environment included adult hematology and chemotherapy wards of Shafa Hospital in Ahwaz. Data were collected using a demographic form and a questionnaire in order to measure the severity of fatigue, which were completed by all the patients before the intervention. Then, the patients had 40 minutes exercise, 3 times a week for 4 weeks. The effect of exercise versus fatigue intensity was measured at the end of every week. Data were analyzed using SPSS¹³.

RESULTS: The mean of the fatigue severity in the weeks after exercise was significantly different from the week before the exercise. Fredman test showed significant differences between all the weeks before and after the exercise. The mean of the fatigue severity was 3.69 on the week 0 (before the exercise), and it decreased to 3.57 on the first week after exercise, 3.46 on the second week, 2.58 on the third week and 1.69 on the forth week.

CONCLUSIONS: Considering the results of this study, exercise and work out can be an effective factor in reducing fatigue in patients.

KEY WORDS: Exercise, Fatigue, Cancer, Chemotherapy.