Femke Jansen (Researcher at Amsterdam UMC and PI of NET-QUBIC) and colleagues have received €723,000 from KWF Dutch Cancer Society to investigate the long-term consequences of head and neck cancer and its treatment. The grant enables a ten-year follow-up of participants in the NET-QUBIC cohort.

Following the same patients for ten years

NET-QUBIC began recruiting newly diagnosed head and neck cancer patients and their partners in 2014. The cohort, initiated by Professor Irma Verdonck-de Leeuw, originally followed participants from diagnosis until two years after treatment. In 2018, a KWF Young Investigator Grant awarded to Jansen extended the follow-up period to five years.

The new grant makes it possible to return to the same patient cohort ten years after treatment, providing insight into how health and quality of life develop over an extended period.

Long-term morbidity, toxicity and patient-reported outcomes

The researchers will examine long-term morbidity, treatment-related toxicity and patient-reported outcomes, distinguishing between effects that persist over time and those that emerge years after treatment. The ten-year assessment will repeat several earlier measurements, although some physical tests will be shortened or omitted to account for the increasing age of participants.

A new focus is the development of comorbidities during the ten-year period. These will be studied both among surviving participants and among participants who have died. By comparing morbidity and quality of life with those of matched cancer-free controls, the researchers aim to distinguish the effects of natural ageing from those associated with head and neck cancer and its treatment.

Stress, inflammation and symptoms

The study will also investigate which symptoms, as measured using patient-reported outcomes, occur together and how these relate to the stress and immune systems. Blood and saliva samples collected during home visits will be used to examine biomarkers, including cortisol and markers of inflammation. The researchers will also assess associations between clinician-rated toxicities, clinical factors and immune biomarkers.

Post-traumatic growth

The study will also explore potential positive changes following cancer, known as post-traumatic growth. This concept describes how people may reconsider their priorities, relationships and what they value in life after a major adverse event such as a cancer diagnosis.

By extending NET-QUBIC’s longitudinal data to ten years, the project aims to inform more individually tailored information, guidance and supportive care for people living with the long-term and late consequences of head and neck cancer.

More about NET-QUBIC on the NET-QUBIC website [in Dutch]