Survivorship

I admire my cancer patients. Surviving cancer is a life changing event. As a child I used to admire sports figures, astronauts and John Wayne. Today it is my patients that I think of first when asked “who do you admire most?”

An important aspect of today’s treatment of cancer is survivorship; the numbers of patients within the next ten years who will become cancer survivors is astounding.  The National Institute of Heath estimates that in the next ten to twenty years there may be as many as 20 million people that have battled & survived cancer.   This is an area that the oncology community is just now awakening to.  We are beginning to develop programs and ways in which to care for these survivors.  As a cancer survivor there are issues, both medical and emotionally, that affect a patient’s life.  I think it is important that we as a medical community address these.  It is common nowadays to find whole issues of medical journals, and advocacy magazines devoted to survivorship. Foundations such as the Livestrong foundation and the Susan Kohmen Foundation and the other wonderful foundations around the world are aggressively addressing the needs and supporting cancer survivors.  Another organization that I have great admiration for is Turning Point; this is a Kansas City based company that their whole goal is to improve the lives of cancer survivors.

 In my own practice, when a patient is first diagnosed, we have patients go through a “chemotherapy teaching” class that is instructed by one of our nurse practitioners. We now also have a similar class for patients at the end of their treatment. This class gives them all the various resources that are available to them in turns of survivorship.  I strongly encourage patients that have completed their treatment to find support in as many different areas as they can.  Support can be obtained through the nurses and doctors of an oncology practice, through national organizations such as the Lance Armstrong Livestrong Foundation, and local companies like Turning Point. The American Cancer o Society also has a great number of support groups and survivorship programs.  Listed at the end of this article are some websites of various organizations that have information for survivors.

www.livestrong.com

www.turningpointkc.org

www.komen.org

www.canceradvocacy.org