Feasibility study for the use of the UK Biobank Longevity Explorer (UbbLE) questionnaires to predict 5 year mortality in head & neck cancer patients

Background Based on the population-based UK Biobank data from in-depth phenotyping of about a half million adults and longitudinal follow-up, a survival prediction model was developed for UK inhabitants (Ganna & Ingelsson, 2015). Derived from that model, the UK Biobank Longevity Explorer (UbbLE) is available (http://ubble.co.uk/risk-calculator) in order to capture the biographic age and 10-12 gender-specific questions to determine the so called Ubble age and the five-year risk of dying according to the survival observed in women or men of age 40 to 70 with similar answers. To implement an estimator for survival probability into our tumor board document, a feasibility study was conducted.

Methods The gender-specific questionnaires were translated into German and provided in printed form to patients providing informed consent (174/179; 97 %). A total of 86/174 (49 %) completely answered questionnaires from 54 men and 32 women in the age of 40 to 70 years could be analyzed to assess differences between biographic and Ubble age.

Conclusions Despite higher age of female patients (p = 0.02), the Ubble age in women and men was not different (p = 0.73). Whereas the Ubble age of women (mean 57.2, SEM 2.4 years) was nearly identical to the biographic age (mean 57.7, SEM 1.4 years), the Ubble age in men (58.2, SEM 1.8 years) was higher (p = 0.01) as the biographic age (53.4, SEM 1.0 years). These differences could be linked to the higher proportion of men (57.4 %) versus women (28.1 %) having the 95 % confidence interval of Ubble age not including their biographic age. All male HNC patients belong to this group.

Conclusion The use of the translated Ubble questionnaires is feasible allowing us to start a validation study.

Poster-PDF A-1807.PDF

Publication History

Article published online:
10 June 2020