OBJECTIVE To explore the internal characteristics of symptom cluster of gastric cancer patients with Helicobacter pylori infection and analyze the influencing factors.

METHODS By means of cross-sectional survey, totally 211 gastric cancer patients who were treated in west campus of the First Affiliated Hospital of USTC from Dec 2021 to May 2022 were recruited as the research subjects. The patients who had fatigue, pain, loss of appetite, sleep disturbance, anxiety and depression during the chemotherapy were collected and grouped based on latent class model. Multivariate logistic regression analysis was performed for the influencing factors.

RESULTS The symptom cluster manifestations of the patients with H. pylori infection-related gastric cancer were identified as 4 classes and were named as ′low symptom burden class′, ′high symptom burden class′, ′low psychological class′and ′high psychological class′, respectively; the four classes accounted for 27.4%, 19.0%, 43.1% and 10.4%, respectively. The result of multivariate logistic regression analysis showed that no history of smoking (OR=0.283, P=0.013) was the protective factor for the ′low psychological class′, and no history of alcohol drinking (OR=10.852, P=0.011) was the risk factor for the ′high psychological class′.

CONCLUSION There are significant classifying features for the symptom cluster of the patients with H. pylori infection-related gastric cancer during the chemotherapy. It is necessary to formulate individualized management and intervention plans for the patients based on the symptom characteristics.