‘Socio-Demographic Characteristics Associated with Quality of Life-Scores among Palliative Care Cancer Patients in Kenya’ Brief Review
This paper, while not exactly revolutionary in its findings, is exactly what I hope to find in my research. For the focus of the paper to be centered around societal differences from patient to patient is the small-scale goal of my work, just while factoring in differences in societal composition for different countries.
Unsurprisingly, higher QOL scores were associated with higher age, education levels, monthly income, and marriage rates. Despite surveying individuals of multiple different forms of cancer (as previously discussed in one of my posts, with form of cancer holding considerable weight in QOL score), such patterns remain constant. It is interesting to note, however, that those of age 65+ had the highest physical QOL scores. Based on simple reasoning, one might consider that unexpected data, as it’s commonly accepted that the body deteriorates with age. Perhaps the presence of cancer, therefore, has a less significant change in an individual’s physical health at such an age, as there is a lower standard beforehand. I’m unsure, however.
It’s interesting to assess the presence of a correlation between increased QOL and higher levels of education. Although there is a persistent argument surrounding education versus intelligence, and especially surrounding education and self-fulfillment, I suppose that such an argument often comes from a place of privilege. In cases such as these, when the benchmark for ‘education’ is more closely linked to sheer literacy, education admittedly becomes a plausible contributor to self-efficacy. Furthermore, the study’s insistence on focusing on the importance of health literacy is a reasonable explanation as well.
Concerning occupation status and QOL score, it’s worth analyzing the presence of a positive correlation between high-level occupation and spiritual QOL (social, financial, and psychological QOL correlations seem fairly straightforward). Perhaps the correlation is simply a byproduct of a strong positive correlation in other realms and as such, was ‘swept up’ as a result, but if not, it would be an interesting data point to consider. Perhaps this too is simply a feature of the Western mind, but higher income work, from my perspective, has oftentimes been associated with shakier moral standing (ex. think the engineer and the Lockheed Martin offer), and as such possibly a lesser spiritual affiliation. Maybe Kenyan culture, however, places greater spiritual emphasis on jobs of great importance (with greater importance then demanding a greater salary).
Marital status and its influence on QOL seemed more cut-and-dry to me. People like attachment, especially in times of stress.
From this text comes a ton of references to pursue, including Buddhism and medical futility, Quality of life among breast cancer patient in Yemen, and a few others.
