Professional Life After Breast Cancer: Feasibility of a Coaching Program for an Adapted Return to Work (VISIBILITE)

The diagnosis of breast cancer and the treatments implemented have a significant impact on the professional situation.

Maintaining employment and/or reintegration into working life are therefore major issues for cancer patients.

This trial proposes to study the feasibility of a support/coaching program for a return to work in patients after breast cancer.

Study Overview

• Status: Recruiting
• Conditions: Breast Cancer
• Intervention / Treatment: Other: Questionnaires; Other: back to work coaching

Detailed Description

This study involves patients with breast cancer at the end of their adjuvant treatment.

The aim of this study is to evaluate the feasibility of a support program for an adapted return to work of these patients.

This back-to-work support program including an individual interview to identify patient needs and expectations, 7 coaching workshops (every 3 weeks +/- 15 days) and a final individual assessment post workshops.

The evolution of quality of life, psychological distress and perceptions concerning work will also be evaluated through assessments and questionnaires before (inclusion) and after the support program [1 month (+/- 7 days) and 6 months (+/- 1 month) after the final individual assessment].

The study also aims to estimate the recruitment rate in the study and to assess the satisfaction of this support program.

Finally, the impact of this support program on the return to work will be described.

This initial study will eventually lead to a larger research protocol on the effectiveness of the program, using a randomized controlled trial design.

• Study Type: Interventional
• Enrollment (Estimated): 25
• Phase: Not Applicable

Contacts and Locations

• Study Contact: Name: Jean-Pierre Bleuse; Phone Number: +33 04 67 61 31 02; Email: jean-pierre.bleuse@icm.unicancer.fr

Study Locations

• France
  • Montpellier, France, 34298
    • Recruiting
    • Institut du Cancer de Montpellier
    • Contact: Estelle Guerdoux, Dr; Phone Number: +33 04 67 61 24 68; Email: estelle.guerdoux-ninot@icm.unicancer.fr

Participation Criteria

Eligibility Criteria

• Ages Eligible for Study: 18 years and older (Adult, Older Adult)
• Accepts Healthy Volunteers: No

Description

Inclusion Criteria:

• Age ≥18 years
• Patients cared at the Montpellier Cancer Institute (ICM) for non-metastatic breast cancer who have received adjuvant treatment (radiotherapy and/or chemotherapy)
• Patient who has completed adjuvant treatment, except for hormonotherapy
• Patient practicing a profession at the time of diagnosis, looking for a job or in professional retraining at the time of diagnosis
• Patient expressing spontaneously or on request of the oncologist physical or psychological difficulties in the professional field
• Patient wishing to be accompanied for an adapted return to her current job or for a return to a new more adapted job
• Patient who signed the informed consent after informed information by her clinician

Exclusion Criteria:

• Metastatic breast cancer or any other cancer within the last 5 years
• Patient who haven't completed herr adjuvant treatment (chemotherapy and/or radiotherapy)
• Psychological condition requiring therapeutic support (objectified by the Mini International Neuropsychiatric Interview test (MINI) by identifying a Diagnostic and Statistical Manual (DSM)-IV Axis I psychiatric disorder (American Psychiatric Association, 1994) Sheehan et al., 1998) with the patient's refusal of adequate psychiatric treatment (medicated or not) at the time of inclusion in the study
• Severely impaired global cognitive functioning (objectified by an adjusted score of less than 20 on the Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA) test)
• Physical inability to answer questionnaires

Study Plan

How is the study designed?

Design Details

• Primary Purpose: Other
• Allocation: N/A
• Interventional Model: Single Group Assignment
• Masking: None (Open Label)

Number of Arms

1

Arms and Interventions

Participant Group / Arm	Intervention / Treatment
Other: Assessment of the feasibility and impact of a back-to-work support program; questionnaires, back to work coaching	Other: Questionnaires; Quality of life questionnaires, work perception questionnaires, psychological distress questionnaire; Other: back to work coaching; Back-to-work support program including an individual interview to identify patient needs and expectations, 7 coaching workshops (every 3 weeks +/- 15 days) and a final individual assessment post workshops

What is the study measuring?

Primary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure	Measure Description	Time Frame
Patient adherence of a coaching program for an adapted return to work	Assessment of the feasibility of a support program for an adapted return to work in patients with breast cancer, after their adjuvant treatment. Feasibility is defined by the proportion of patients who have adhered to the support program, with the patient attending at least 5 of the 7 proposed sessions.	through study completion, an average of 1 year

Secondary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure	Measure Description	Time Frame
Impact of the support program on the return to work	Description of the impact of the support program on return to work, defined as any return to work, regardless of the number of hours worked by the patient before diagnosis. The description will be made by the number of patients with a return to work (resumption of previous activity or new professional activity) and, if applicable, at what date.	At 1 month and at 6 months
Estimation of recruitment rate in the study	Estimation of recruitment rate in the study by the proportion of patients agreeing to participate in the program among eligible patients	At inclusion
Evolution of perceptions regarding work importance	The score on a visual analog "work importance" scale, ranging from 0 to 10 (10 indicating a high level of importance).	AT inclusion, at 1 month and 6 months
Evolution of Work Ability	by the Work Ability Index, on a scale of 0 to 10 (10 indicating significant ability).	AT inclusion, at 1 month and 6 months
Evolution of self-efficacy	The self-efficacy score , obtained on the Lagerveld et al. (2010) to 11 items (with a high score indicating a high degree of self-efficacy.	AT inclusion, at 1 month and 6 months
Satisfaction of the support program Satisfaction of the support program	Assessment of the satisfaction of the support program by coaching. Assessment by program satisfaction score on a visual analog scale ranging from 1 to 10 (10 indicating high satisfaction)	At 1 month and at 6 months
Quality of life (QoL)	By the QoL score obtained on the EORTC QLQ-C30 & EORTC QLQ-BR23 questionnaires	At inclusion, at 1 month and at 6 months
Evolution of the psychological distress of patients	Description of the evolution of the psychological distress of patients. Measured by HADS scale (Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale). The HADS is a 14 items questionnaire: 7 items related to anxiety and 7 items related to depression scored on a scale. Scores for items in each subscale of the HADS are summed to produce an anxiety score (HADS-A) or a depression score (HADS-D), or can be added to produce a total score corresponding to emotional distress (HADS-T). Each item is rated on a 4-point Likert scale (1 = "not at all", 2 = "a little", 3 = "quite a bit", and 4 = "very much"), for a total score ranging from 0-21 for each subscale. The entire scale (emotional distress) range from 0 to 42, with higher scores indicating more distress.	At inclusion, at 1 month and at 6 months

Collaborators and Investigators

• Sponsor: Institut du Cancer de Montpellier - Val d'Aurelle
• Investigators: Study Chair: Estelle Guerdoux, Dr, Institut du Cancer de Montpellier - Val d'aurelle

Publications and helpful links

General Publications

• Banning M. Employment and breast cancer: a meta-ethnography. Eur J Cancer Care (Engl). 2011 Nov;20(6):708-19. doi: 10.1111/j.1365-2354.2011.01291.x. Epub 2011 Sep 20.
• de Boer AG, Verbeek JH, Spelten ER, Uitterhoeve AL, Ansink AC, de Reijke TM, Kammeijer M, Sprangers MA, van Dijk FJ. Work ability and return-to-work in cancer patients. Br J Cancer. 2008 Apr 22;98(8):1342-7. doi: 10.1038/sj.bjc.6604302. Epub 2008 Mar 18.
• Arfi A, Baffert S, Soilly AL, Huchon C, Reyal F, Asselain B, Neffati S, Rouzier R, Hequet D. Determinants of return at work of breast cancer patients: results from the OPTISOINS01 French prospective study. BMJ Open. 2018 May 18;8(5):e020276. doi: 10.1136/bmjopen-2017-020276.
• Barnes AJ, Robert N, Bradley CJ. Job attributes, job satisfaction and the return to health after breast cancer diagnosis and treatment. Psychooncology. 2014 Feb;23(2):158-64. doi: 10.1002/pon.3385. Epub 2013 Sep 3.
• Ekbladh E, Thorell LH, Haglund L. Perceptions of the work environment among people with experience of long term sick leave. Work. 2010;35(2):125-36. doi: 10.3233/WOR-2010-0964.

Study record dates

Study Major Dates

• Study Start (Actual): September 13, 2021
• Primary Completion (Actual): January 31, 2024
• Study Completion (Estimated): August 22, 2027

Study Registration Dates

• First Submitted: September 7, 2021
• First Submitted That Met QC Criteria: September 20, 2021
• First Posted (Actual): September 24, 2021

Study Record Updates

• Last Update Posted (Actual): March 25, 2025
• Last Update Submitted That Met QC Criteria: February 11, 2025
• Last Verified: February 1, 2025

More Information

Terms related to this study

• Keywords: return to work
• Additional Relevant MeSH Terms: Neoplasms by Site; Neoplasms; Skin Diseases; Breast Diseases; Breast Neoplasms
• Other Study ID Numbers: PROICM 2020-07 VIS; 2020-A00955-34 (Other Identifier: ID RCB number of competent autority in France)

Plan for Individual participant data (IPD)

• Plan to Share Individual Participant Data (IPD)?: NO

Drug and device information, study documents

• Studies a U.S. FDA-regulated drug product: No
• Studies a U.S. FDA-regulated device product: No