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Abstract Breast cancer is the most common malignancy in women, it constitutes a major public health issue globally with over 1 million new cases diagnosed annually resulting in over 400,000 annual deaths, arm lymphoedema is a common side effect that can begin during or after breast cancer treatment with surgery and radiation. Wide variation in the incidence of lymphoedema following breast cancer treatment was 38.3% to 83% of cases, so improve the quality of life for women sustaining complications of breast cancer treatment related lymphoedema is very important. Aim of this study was to improve the quality of life for women sustaining complications of breast cancer treatment related lymphoedema through: assess the general knowledge of women with breast cancer about arm lymphoedema, and, plan, implement, and evaluated the impact of intervention health education program on improving quality of life for women with lymphoedema post mastectomy and radiotherapy related to breast cancer. Subjects and methods: A descriptive Cross - Sectional design was used in the first phase of this study to assess the general knowledge of women with arm lymphoedema post mastectomy, and then a Quasi-experimental design was used in the intervention phase to evaluate the impact of efficacy health educational program given to those women to improve their quality of life. Results: This study revealed that, the majority of premenopausal group (95%) aged less than 45 years old, while more than two thirds (62.5%) of postmenopausal group aged less than 55 years old, All of both studied subjects had inadequate knowledge about arm lymphoedema related to breast cancer at preprogram which improved post program to reach to all of premenopausal and (90.0%) among postmenopausal had adequate knowledge. Also all of both studied subjects had inadequate self- care practices at pre program, while their practice improved and increased to reach to (92.5% & 72.5%) respectively post program. all of both studied subjects were suffer from poor quality of life in general preprogram while post program their quality of life in general improved to high level to reach to ( 82.5% & 77.5% ) respectively, there were statistically significant differences between the educational level, social class and residency of both studied groups in relation to self-care practices and total quality of life pre and post program.This study recommended that, more attention should be given for early identification and assessment of arm lymphoedema post-operative from physicians, and nursing staff for early nursing intervention and teach women about, self-care practices such as nutrition, medications, practice exercises, hand and arm care to improve their quality of life. |