Iran Journal of Nursing

1. Introduction
Today’s knowledge is looking for a way to prolong life. Scientific advances to provide a longer life are challenging due to a person’s problems with increasing age in different systems. This adds to the importance of paying attention to aging and having physiological and psycho-social information about the elderly person and his life situation for optimal care during this period and preventing possible problems. With the increase in life expectancy due to advances in the recognition and treatment of diseases and rising health, aging and chronic illnesses occur. Also, old age is associated with life-threatening factors such as cancer, which has various physical, psychological, and social complications. 
The growing number of cancer patients worldwide and in our country has made it a health problem, and health care tried to prevent it. Chemotherapy-induced peripheral neuropathy is a complication of chemotherapy. It is a serious complication that presents with damage to distal areas and a pattern of symmetrical diffusion of peripheral nerves and may be caused by different groups of drugs such as chemotherapy drugs. The prevalence of chemotherapy-induced peripheral neuropathy is much higher in patients receiving several chemotherapy drugs (this is true in elderly patients), and its adverse effects on various aspects of patients’ lives are undeniable. Untreated symptoms of peripheral neuropathy usually cause pain and dysfunction in patients’ daily lives, affecting the Quality of Life (QoL) of this group of patients. Despite the importance of this issue, its evaluation has often been neglected by researchers, health professionals, and staff, and limited research has been done in this area, especially on the elderly. Therefore, the present study was designed and conducted to determine the QoL of the elderly with peripheral neuropathy caused by chemotherapy in selected educational and medical centers at the Iran University of Medical Sciences in 2020.
2. Method
The present study is a descriptive cross-sectional study. The research samples were 170 elderly people with chemotherapy-induced peripheral neuropathy referred to Hazrat Rasool Akram (PBUH), Firoozgar, and Firoozabadi who, having the conditions for inclusion in the study (being over 60 years old, ability to respond to Have questions and fluency in Persian, at least one month has passed since the start of chemotherapy, no diabetes, chronic kidney failure, burgers, chronic liver failure, bone and vertebral fractures, AIDS, Lyme, Shingle, syndrome Guillain-Barre and systemic lupus erythematosus (one of the complications of which can be neuropathy) (no cognitive impairment (score 7 and above on the AMT scale)) and after obtaining informed written consent, were selected by convenience sampling. 
In the research environment, while stating the research objectives to the authorities and assuring the elderly to keep the information confidential, they obtained informed written consent from the elderly to participate in the research. Data collection tools included demographic characteristics form and Lipad Quality of Life Questionnaire (LEIPAD) completed within 3 months. This questionnaire is designed as a Likert, and each question has four options that are scored from zero (worst case) to three (best case). The minimum score is zero, and the maximum is 93. A score between 0 and 31 indicates a poor QoL for the elderly. A score between 31 and 46 indicates a moderate QoL for the elderly. A score above 46 indicates a high QoL for the elderly. To analyze the data from descriptive statistics (frequency and percentage of frequency for qualitative research variables and minimum and maximum, Mean±SD for quantitative research variables) and inferential statistics (independent t-test, analysis of variance, Pearson and Kroos correlation coefficient) used. The collected data were analyzed by SPSS software v. 16. The significance level was considered less than P<0.05.
3. Results
The Mean±SD age of the participating elderly was 66.69±6.49, which according to the World Health Organization (WHO) classification, was in the group of young elderly. Among the participants, 51.8% were female, and 48.2% were male. QoL was 81.8% of the elderly in the high level, 15.9% in the medium level, and 2.3% in the low level. The results showed that the QoL of the studied elderly had a statistically significant relationship with gender. Income adequacy had a statistically significant association with QoL (P=0.002), and also, the QoL in the elderly with relatively sufficient income was significantly higher than the elderly with insufficient income(P=0.001). Also, the mean score obtained in the working elderly was significantly higher than the housewife (P=0.024). Duration of the disease was another variable that had a statistically significant relationship with QoL (P=0.019), and the mean score of QoL in the elderly with a duration of less than one year was significantly higher than the elderly with a duration of more than 5 years was (P=0.041). The results showed that the duration of the disease, less than one year with a standard coefficient of 0.304, had the most significant effect on the QoL of the elderly.
4. Conclusion
In this study, the QoL of the elderly with chemotherapy-induced peripheral neuropathy was observed. QoL was also significantly associated with gender, income adequacy, employment status, and duration of illness. The QoL was high among the elderly male, With sufficient income, employed, and ill for less than a year. Also, the QoL in social, mental, anxiety and depression, life satisfaction, physical, and self-care dimensions were desirable, but in the sexual dimension, they had an undesirable QoL. It is believed that the results of this study will significantly help in understanding the health status and needs of the elderly to promote health and senior services based on health-related needs. Therefore, developing epidemiological and clinical studies in this field is an important step forward.

Ethical Considerations
Compliance with ethical guidelines
This article is produced by IR.IUMS.REC.1399.478 Research Plan No.99-1-3-18002 approved by the Deputy Is a researcher at Iran University of Medical Sciences.

Funding
The project is sponsored by the University of Medical Sciences and Health Services It is Iranian medicine.

Authors' contributions
Supervisor, Responsible for drafting, data collection, project management, editing and finalization, methodology, completing the final report: Farideh Bastani; Author of the draft, data collection, editing and finalization, research: Mohammad Massoud Hassani.

Conflict of interest
The authors declared no conflict of interest.

Acknowledgments
The authors of this article express their gratitude and appreciation to the esteemed Vice Chancellor for Education and Health Centers of the University for granting permission to conduct the study. The authors also thank the respected seniors participating in this study.



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