of patients need more cancer and treatment related information and 17% phoned to the caring team during irradiation period. The potential benefit is confirmed by 67% of the population and 64% would have been very interested in participating if the project had been operational at the time of their radiotherapy. Most of the patients (93%) give equal importance to communicate with health professionals as with the virtual community of survivors. 3% seek moral encouragement and exchange of personal experiences, 45% information only and 52% have both motivations. Among disinterested patients, number one reason (73%) is intimacy preservation while 20% of patients prefer face-to-face interactions and only 6% are unwilling to cope with technical aspects of computers because they do not feel comfortable. Interestingly, age does not seem to influence the decision to join the project. Conclusions: A project of rendering patients who undergo radiotherapy able to communicate electronically with both a help group of survivors and a team of health professionals is favourably considered by a majority of the target population. Physical accessibility to the Web is however far from being generalized. Providing free microcomputers constitutes a prerequisite and Internet training lessons are mandatory. E-mailing, instant messaging and chat rooms are thought as valuable tools to improve an insufficient information about cancer and treatment. When existing, disinterest is not linked to age nor technicality but to a preference for face-to-face interactions. If the requirements pointed out by the pilot study are fulfilled, e-communication could correlate to patients better compliance and quality of life. Without excluding the use of conventional modalities, our research will try to maximize the benefits of this challenging new area. 2394 Assessment of Quality Life of Nasopharyngeal Carcinoma Patients with EORTC QLQ C30 and H&N 30: Turkish Oncology Group, Head and Neck Working Party Study M. Cengiz, 1 E. Ozyar, 1 M. Esassolak, 2 M. Altun, 3 M. Akmansu, 4 M. Sen, 5 O. Uzel, 6 A. Yavuz, 7 G. Dalmaz, 8 C. Uzal, 9 A. Hicsonmez, 10 M. Hayran 11 1 Radiation Oncology, Hacettepe University, Faculty of Medicine, Ankara, Turkey, 2 Radiation Oncology, Ege University, Faculty of Medicine, Izmir, Turkey, 3 Radiation Oncology, Istanbul University, Faculty of Medicine, Istanbul, Turkey, 4 Radiation Oncology, Gazi University, Faculty of Medicine, Ankara, Turkey, 5 Radiation Oncology, Dokuz Eylul University, Faculty of Medicine, Izmir, Turkey, 6 Radiation Oncology, Istanbul University, Cerrahpasa Faculty of Medicine, Istanbul, Turkey, 7 Radiation Oncology, Karadeniz Teknik University, Cerrahpasa Faculty of Medicine, Trabzon, Turkey, 8 Radiation Oncology, Akdeniz University, Faculty of Medicine, Antalya, Turkey, 9 Radiation Oncology, Trakya University, Faculty of Medicine, Edirne, Turkey, 10 Radiation Oncology, Ankara University, Faculty of Medicine, Ankara, Turkey, 11 Preventive Oncology, Hacettepe University, Faculty of Medicine, Ankara, Turkey Purpose/Objective: The current study reports on long-term Quality of life (QoL) status following conventional radiotherapy in 187 nasopharyngeal carcinoma patients from 14 centers in Turkey Materials/Methods: Patients with the diagnosis of nasopharyngeal carcinoma treated in 14 centers in Turkey with minimum 6 months of follow-up in complete remission were asked to complete Turkish version of EORTC QLQ C30 and HN 35 questionnaires. Each center participated with the required information of clinical data including age at diagnosis, gender, symptoms on admission, follow-up period, treatment modalities, radiotherapy dose and AJCC 1997 tumor stage. Thirty-three QoL scores of each patient including function, global health status and symptoms were calculated as instructed in EORTC C30 QLQ scoring manual. All of the scales and single-item measures range in score from 0 to 100. A high scale score represents a higher response level. Thus a high score for a functional scale represents a high / healthy level of functioning, a high score for the global health status / QoL represents a high QoL, but a high score for a symptom scale / item represents a high level of symptomatology/problems. Kruskal-Wallis and Mann-Whitney U non-parametric tests were used for comparisons. Results: One hundred eighty-seven patients with median age of 46 years (range; 16 –79 years) participated to complete the questionnaires. Median follow-up time was 3.4 years (range 6 months-24 years). All patients have received external beam radiotherapy. Beside external radiotherapy, 59 patients underwent brachytherapy boost, 70 patients received concomittant and 85 patients received adjuvant/neoadjuvant chemotherapy. Most of the patients in the analysis (75%) were in advanced stage [(Stage III, n = 85 (45.4%); stage IV, n = 55(29%)]. Median global health status was calculated as 66. Parameters that increase global health status were male gender, early stage disease and patients with less than 4 year follow up (p  0.05). Functional parameters were better in male and early stage disease. Factors yielding better symptom scores were short interval after treatment (10 scores), male gender (7 scores) and lower radiation dose (6 scores). Neoadjuvant or adjuvant chemotherapy did not have any effect on quality of life whereas concomitant chemotherapy adversely affected 4 symptom scores. Conclusions: It is remarkable that quality of life is adversely affected in our nasopharyngeal carcinoma patients treated with combined treatments. The factors that adversely affect quality of life are advanced tumor stage, female gender and long term follow up. Further controlled studies evaluating both pre and post-radiotherapy status are necessary to clarify the contribution of each treatment modality in quality of life. 2395 Acute Gastrointestinal, Genitourinary, and Dermatologic Toxicity During Dose Escalated 3DCRT Using an Intra-Rectal Balloon for Prostate Gland Localization and Immobilization R. F. Woel, 1 C. Beard, 1 M. Chen, 2 M. Hurwitz, 1 M. Loffredo, 1 E. McMahon, 1 J. Ching, 1 L. Lopes, 1 A. V. D’Amico 1 1 Department of Radiation Oncology, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, 2 Statistics, University of Connecticut, Storrs, CT Purpose/Objective: We determined the acute gastrointestinal (GI), genitourinary (GU) and dermatologic (D) toxicity during dose escalated 3-dimensional conformal radiation therapy (3DCRT). An intra-rectal balloon adapted from the device (Medrad, Indianola, Pennsylvania) used for endorectal coil magnetic resonance imaging was utilized for prostate gland localization and immobilization. Materials/Methods: From September 2001 to September 2003, 46 men with clinical tumor category T1c to T3a, and at least one high-risk feature (PSA 10, Gleason score 7 or higher, or MRI evidence of either extra capsular extension (ECE) or S571 Proceedings of the 46th Annual ASTRO Meeting