The Cancer Experience

Physician Assisted Suicide is but a subdivision of euthanasia, and as quality of death becomes a more relevant societal issue, legal and political pressure for it will grow.

Not surprisingly, suicide is an avenue of escape for more cancer patients than an equal cohort of their healthy counterparts. The cancer team must be alert to subtle warnings.

The decision to terminate or not is the sole property of the mother, but with steady leadership of her oncologist. Personal moral codes juxtaposed to survival instincts are at play

There are sometimes difficult decisions to be made when a pregnant woman develops cancer and conversely when a woman under cancer treatment becomes pregnant.

The hippocratic principals of antiquity are to a great extent applicable in today's society. We examine the adaptations that have occurred and are currently being scrutinized

The cancer experience (including treatment and emotional aftermath) can and often alter the sex life of both the patient and partner. The two are not, however, mutually exclusive, depending on the specific cancer and the relationship of the partners.

Expediency in the referral of cancer patients to cancer specialists relates to minimizing patient anxiety, rather than a need to start treatment quickly.

Society and the health care system are changing dramatically; and in an attempt to idealize the interaction between the profession and the society, the basics of the adjustments should focus on the repair of the doctor/patient relationship. The physician's role should be view as a higher calling- a vocation - and their expected moral and ethical behavior should reflect it.

Having and treating cancer is a stressful and physically demanding experience that alters the balance of one's life—sometimes in a depressing and negative way, while others turn it into positive energy and lifestyle changes. This blog reflects the latter of the post cancer effects.

On occasions, cancer patients perceive (sometimes correctly) that the treatment is worse than the disease, or even death. After full disclosure, the oncologist should support this quest for autonomy—realizing that what we do should be about the patient, rather than the doctor.

In the October blog, I published a significant statistic that was inaccurate. This is an important correction

Public awareness and individual cancer patient should be initiated by the medical profession, and the societal system should provide life long stimulation and emphasis on the importance of public knowledge. This will prove cost effective; prevention and early detection save lives and money in the long run.

While alluring, alternative cancer treatments are, by and large, not yet scientifically proven. Until properly investigated, such methods should not be used. That said, it is important that we remain open to and interested in promoting innovative and unconventional ideas.

Facing death and enduring cancer is influenced by many factors, not the least of which is a patient's belief about divinity and the after life. That this is solely psychological is unclear and may involve brain neurochemistry, according to some investigators.

Doctors and patients share the human characteristic of being affected by their attitudes and surroundings. In each, the cancer experience of a patient is altered, some positively and some negatively. This essay begins to look at what influences the coping skills of patients, and the impact on the frightening experience of having cancer.

This continuation of the series on communication begins to introduce practical methods to specific types of people, and also begins to consider those dealings that include the patient's family.

The continuum of our discussion on communication between doctor and patient has thus far dealt with the importance of that state and what actually constitutes the ideal. Today's blog is more an attempt to explain what influences the doctor ability to lead and help develop the relationship so important to the cancer experience.

The establishment of and the necessary adjustments in the relationship between oncologist and patient is ideally a priority item. Absent the right human chemistry, the long and trying treatment of a given cancer can be substantially more difficult. Things don't always go as designed and then, the ability to fall back on solid human relationships assumes importance

Essentials of doctor-patient are especially important in cancer patients, and achieving ideal communication, while not easy, renders the whole cancer experience infinitely more tolerable.

Without patient comprehension, a doctor cannot claim to have communicated. Anything less than patient is only medical monolog, and it is the doctor's responsibility to achieve this state. In the world of cancer care, fear is an ever lurking companion for patients, and the better the process of explanation and communication, the less the fear. Ignorance is not bliss.