Official websites use. Share sensitive information only on official, secure websites. The purpose of this study was to examine how quality of life, self-efficacy and appraisal of the illness experience vary among men with prostate cancer and their partners according to age cohort: middle age 50β64 ; young-old 65β74 ; and old-old 75β A descriptive, comparative design was used to examine age-related differences in quality of life and selected psychosocial variables in 69 men with prostate cancer and their spouses.
Cross-sectional data were obtained using standardized instruments with adequate reliability and validity. Findings indicated that patients who were ages 65β74 had better QOL and higher self-efficacy than patients ages 50β64 and less negative appraisal of illness than the other two groups.
Spouses ages 50β64 reported the most distress related to sexual changes in their husbands. Spouses in both the middle age and old-old group had more bother related to hormone therapy than the young-old spouses.
Younger and older prostate cancer survivors and their partners may benefit from tailored interventions designed to improve their quality of life and confidence in managing their treatment outcomes during the survivorship period. Prostate cancer is typically a disease of older men, with the incidence increasing dramatically in men over While prostate cancer is the second leading cause of cancer deaths in men, the number of men living with the disease and with the outcomes of treatment is increasing as our population continues to age [ 1 ].
As adults age, they face normative developmental changes in their daily lives that can cause stress. The diagnosis of prostate cancer requires that they simultaneously adjust to the changes brought about by cancer as well as to other normative changes specific to their age. Often in the research literature, aging couples are viewed as a group without consideration of possible group differences in perception of illness and the ability to deal with an illness such as prostate cancer.
