Aims & Objectives: to evaluate performance status of head & neck cancer patients after receiving treatment. Material And Methods: The present study was conducted in the Department of ENT, SMGS Hospital, GMC Jammu on 100 patients from a period of January 2018 to June 2019.Inclusion criteria in our study were patients with pathologically diagnosed head & neck cancer, age >40 years, pre-treatment performance score > or equal to 80 (Karnofsky scale) .Exclusion criteria in our study were patients with mental illness, patients with distant metastasis, patients who underwent surgery for primary site of disease , patients with age >80 years. Performance status of all patients was assessed using karnofsky performance status scale – before starting treatment, at completion of treatment and 6 months after completion of treatment. Results: According to Karnofsky performance scale index, at completion of treatment- 52% patients showed a score of 60, 33% showed a score of 70 and 3% showed a score of 50, 10% showed a score of 40 and 2 patients died during the completion of treatment. After 6 months of completion of treatment, 48% showed a score of 70, 23% showed a score of 80, 19% showed a score of 90, 7% showed score of 50, 2% showed score of 40 and 1 patient had died during these six months. Conclusion: From our study we can conclude that there is an association between poor performance status, tumour stage and dysphagia.
