Objective: Nowadays, the rate of referral to radiotherapy clinics has also increased due to the development of medical facilities and increased diagnosis of malignant diseases. Implementation of counseling programs by the nurses and health care providers for improving nutritional patterns and simultaneously prevention in cancer patients may improve their health level. Therefore, this study was designed to determine the effect of dietary counseling on gastrointestinal complications in patients receiving abdominal and pelvic radiotherapy.

Patients and Methods: In this randomized clinical trial study, 80 patients referred to the radiotherapy ward of Tohid Hospital in Sanandaj (Kurdistan Province, Iran), during 2018-2019 were randomly categorized into two 40-subject intervention and comparison groups. They received nutritional counseling three times a week in one-hour sessions over 2 consecutive weeks. After that, in the 4th week, both groups were assessed for gastrointestinal complications using the Gastrointestinal Symptom Rating Scale.

Results: The patients in the intervention group had a mean age of 59.95 ± 1.25 years old, and those in the comparison group had a mean age of 61.87 ± 1.41 years old. Moreover, the mean score of gastrointestinal complications was equal to 5.55 ± 0.81 in the comparison group, and it was similar to 1.49 ± 0.25 in the intervention group, which was significantly lower in the intervention group than the control group (p-value = 0.0001). The mean score of the scale in all dimensions except the constipation dimension was not significantly different between the two study groups, and it was significantly lower in the intervention group than that of the control group (p-value = 0.0001).

Conclusions: The findings of the present study revealed that nutrition counseling could be useful in controlling and decreasing acute gastrointestinal complications caused by abdominal and pelvic radiotherapy.