Original Paper Development of a Disease Speci®c Quality of Life (QoL) Questionnaire Module to Supplement the EORTC Core Cancer QoL Questionnaire, the QLQ-C30 in Patients with Pancreatic Cancer D. Fitzsimmons, 1 C.D. Johnson, 1 S. George, 1 S. Payne, 1 A. Andre Ân Sandberg, 2 C. Bassi, 3 H.G. Beger, 4 D. Birk, 4 M.W. Bu È chler, 5 C. Dervenis, 6 L. Fernandez Cruz, 7 H. Friess, 5 A.L. Grahm, 2 J. Jeekel, 8 R. Laugier, 9 D. Meyer, 8 M.W. Singer 10 and T. Tihanyi 11 on behalf of the EORTC Study Group on Quality of Life 1 University of Southampton, University Surgical Unit, Mailpoint 816, Southampton General Hospital, Tremona Road, Southampton SO16 6YD U.K.; 2 Lund University Hospital, Lund, Sweden; 3 Olga Roma Hospital, Verona, Italy; 4 University Hospital of Surgery, Ulm, Germany; 5 Inselspital, Bern, Switzerland; 6 AGIA OLGA Hospital, Athens, Greece; 7 Hospital Clinic, Barcelona, Spain; 8 University Hospital, Rotterdam, The Netherlands; 9 Hopital de la Conception, Marseille, France; 10 University Hospital of Heidelberg, Mannheim, Germany; and 11 Semmelweis University of Medicine, Budapest, Hungary There is overwhelming consensus that quality of life assessment is urgently required in pancreatic cancer, yet little research has been conducted. We report on the development of a disease speci®c questionnaire module to supplement the EORTC core cancer module, the QLQ-C30 in patients with pancreatic cancer, using EORTC quality of life study group guidelines for module development. Relevant QoL issues were generated from literature searches and interviews with health professionals and patients with pancreatic cancer. Issues were constructed into items and provisionally translated. The provisional module was pretested in patients in 8 European centres. The resulting module the QLQ-PAN26 includes 26 items related to disease symptoms, treatment side-eVects and emotional issues speci®c to pancreatic cancer. This should ensure that the module will be sensitive to assess the small but important disease and treatment related QoL changes in pancreatic cancer. The use of the QLQ-C30 and QLQ-PAN26 will provide a comprehensive system of QoL assessment in international trials of pancreatic cancer. # 1999 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved. Key words: pancreatic neoplasm, quality of life, EORTC QLQ-C30, questionnaire Eur J Cancer, Vol. 35, No. 6, pp. 939±941, 1999 INTRODUCTION The outlook for a patient diagnosed with pancreatic ade- nocarcinoma remains gloomy in terms of prognosis and sur- vival, with over 90% dying within a year of diagnosis [1]. Treatment options remain limited. Only 20% of patients may be suitable candidates for a `curative resection', with only 15± 20% of these patients surviving beyond 5 years. The majority of patients receive palliative surgical or medical interventions. The roles of chemotherapy and radiotherapy remain a source of debate within the literature [2] and any bene®t in terms of gain in survival time and alleviation of symptoms must be balanced against the costs of treatment toxicity and any deterioration in quality of life (QoL). There is overwhelming consensus that QoL assessment is urgently required in pan- creatic cancer [3±5]. However, little research has been pub- lished and to our knowledge no disease speci®c questionnaire has been described in the literature. European Journal of Cancer, Vol. 35, No. 6, pp. 939±941, 1999 # 1999 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved Pergamon Printed in Great Britain PII: S0959-8049(99)00047-7 0959-8049/99/$ - see front matter 939 Correspondence to C.D. Johnson Received 17 Nov. 1998; revised 25 Jan. 1999; accepted 3 Feb. 1999.