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| Why people diagnosed with cancer should get a second opinion | 
In terms of treatment options, a second opinion is an opportunity to get a comprehensive understanding of all the appropriate possible treatments. This information can help you make a fully educated and informed decision. For example, some men diagnosed wit ...more
| | Posted By Miles J.Varn At 8/4/2021 12:15:22 PM | | 37 Comments | Post a Comment |
| There is no place for blame in cancer | | | Posted By Jennifer Lycette, MD | At 6/27/2017 12:35:39 PM |
| 8 things doctors want to secretly want to tell their patients | | | Posted By Brian C. Joondeph, MD At 4/5/2017 3:00:18 PM |
| Obamacare isn’t a job killer |  Peter Ubel, MD | Policy | December 12, 2016 According to many conservative pundits, Obamacare is a job killer. Five days before Obama signed the law, in fact, speaker John Boehner declared that the president was pushing “his job-killing government takeover of health care that will hurt small businesses.” Years after the law was passed, critics continued trumpeting this theme, Ted Cruz calling Obamacare “the biggest job-killer in this country,” and even claiming tha ... more | | Posted By Peter Ubel, MD At 12/15/2016 12:45:32 PM |
| Talk to your doctor about health costs. It can save you money. |  Health care is often really costly. And with increasing frequency, a significant chunk of those costs is being passed on to patients in the form of high deductibles, copays, or other out-of-pocket expenses. As a result, millions of Americans struggle to pay medical bills each year. What’s a poor patient to do? For starters: They can ... more | | Posted By Peter Ubel, MD At 4/6/2016 9:57:55 AM |
| These are the technologies that can help achieve the cancer moonshot |  In his State of the Union address in 2016, President Obama pledged a new national effort to find a cure for cancer. This is the cancer “moonshot.” Last year, he announced the launch of the Precision Medicine Initiative — a bold new research effort to revolutionize how we improve health and treat disease. These two strategies together hold the promise of curing cancer or, at least, transforming it into a manageable chronic disease. Negotiations and collaborations are laun ... more | | Posted By Bertalan Mesko, MD, PhD At 2/24/2016 5:52:05 PM |
| 4 ways to handle unsolicited health advice |  4 ways to handle unsolicited health advice Toni Bernhard, JD | Patient | December 6, 2015 Here’s the most distressing piece of unsolicited advice I’ve received to date. It showed up in my Inbox two days after I’d completed a course of radiation for breast cancer. The email was in response to an article I’d written about this new, unexpected turn my life had taken; the article included the fact that, at the time, I was in the middle of a course of radiation treatmen ... more | | Posted By Toni Bernhard, JD At 12/7/2015 2:25:17 PM |
| The people who will cure cancer are the patients |  Sometimes I tell people I’m learning how to treat cancer, and their first question is ‘why haven’t we cured cancer yet?’ We will. It’s coming. In medicine, we’re much better at treating infections than cancer, but it wasn’t always that way:
We didn’t know washing your hands before delivering a baby was safer for women until 1847.
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| | Posted By Kevin D. Bishop, MD, PhD At 4/1/2015 12:41:18 PM |
| Is it ever appropriate for us to choose the timing of our death? |  Human life is a gift. Death, too, can be a gift. Is it ever appropriate for us to choose the timing of our death? Brittany Maynard, 29, was diagnosed with a stage 4 glioblastoma, an aggressive and uniformly fatal brain tumor. With the blessing of her family and millions of supporters around the world, she ended her life in Portland, Oregon, with a fatal dose of barbiturates prescribed by a physician. Oregon is one of five states, in addition to Washingt ... more | | Posted By Ashine Ash Emrani, MD At 11/26/2014 2:08:54 PM |
| The difficult conversation everyone must have |  During my first year of medical school, in the last year of my father’s life, his oncologist had a difficult discussion with him and my mother- the decision to become do-not-resuscitate (DNR). I remember my mother was taken aback, my father was relieved and I was deeply saddened. However, when I got the call that my father may not make it out of the hospital this last time, I was comforted in knowing that I was armed with my father’s wishes. Unfortunately, th ... more | | Posted By Christin M. Giordano, P.A. At 11/5/2014 10:32:25 AM |
| 7 Ways to Help Your Caregiver |  My illness has been as hard on my caregiver-husband as it’s been on me. I know how fortunate I am that he’s stuck around and that he never complains about the extra burdens he’s had to take on. My heart goes out to those of you who don’t have someone to care for you in this way. This piece covers several ways in which you can ease your caregiver’s burden. It focuses on caregivers who are partners but, unless the care-for-one is a child, these sugg ... more | | Posted By Toni Bernhard At 11/5/2014 10:27:13 AM |
| Responding to cancer as the surgeon or the survivor |  “The plastic surgeons tell me that women who like to swim do much better with reconstruction than with prostheses,” says a young breast surgeon at our weekly breast cancer tumor board, the working conference where we discuss every new breast cancer patient before starting treatment. There’s a slight note of surprise in her voice; to her, it’s simply another consideration when advising women before mastectomy. For decades, ... more | | Posted By Carol Scott-Conner, MD At 5/9/2014 2:48:43 PM |
| A struggle against cancer becomes a financial worry | | | Posted By Laura Sander, MD, MPH | Physician At 3/26/2014 6:53:10 PM |
| A 10-step process to finding a good doctor Val Jones, MD | Physician | March 25, 2014 |  Val Jones, MD | Physician | Most people, including physicians, rely on personal references to find a good doctor. But what do you do when you’re far from home, or you don’t know anyone with firsthand knowledge of local doctors? My parents recently asked me to recommend a physician for them in a state where I knew none of my colleagues personally. This is the 10-step process that I used to help them navigate their way to an excellent specialist &m ... more | | Posted By Val Jones, MD | Physician | At 3/26/2014 6:49:55 PM |
| The conspiracy of cancer prognosis |  Rick Boulay, MD - Conditions | March 1, 2014 It should be easy, right? I mean, I am a professional with what feels like eons of training. So how can an oncologist with years of experience fail at perhaps the most important question a patient can ask, ”How long do I have, Doc?” ... more | | Posted By Rick Boulay, MD At 3/4/2014 3:27:20 PM |
| Chronic conditions don’t have normal business hours |  Patient | February 27, 2014 It looks like an airport lounge without the rolling suitcases. There are about 20 of us cancer survivor-types fiddling with our phones or reading the newspaper. A few of us are sipping delicious contrast fluid in preparation for a scan, but most of us are waiting ... more | | Posted By Jessie Gruman, founder and president, Center for Advancing Health At 3/4/2014 3:14:02 PM |
| The sense of abandonment from my society | | | Posted By Robert Fogerty, MD At 12/27/2013 3:40:52 PM |
| You Also Can't Keep Your Doctor I had great cancer doctors and health insurance. My plan was cancelled. Now I worry how long I'll live. | 
Everyone now is clamoring about Affordable Care Act winners and losers. I am one of the losers.more | | Posted By Edie Littlefield Sundby At 11/4/2013 12:44:22 PM |
| Weighing Surgeries in Light of a Breast Cancer Gene |  When Tracy Dunbrook, a bioethicist in Sherman, Conn., tested positive for the BRCA gene mutation, she was told she had a 40 to 60 percent chance of developing ovarian cancer in her lifetime. Doctors advised her to have her ovaries removed. She considered going further and having a more | | Posted By By JILL WERMAN HARRIS- NY Times At 11/1/2013 1:08:02 PM |
| The side effects of cancer treatment can become permanent glitches |  September 24, 2013 Sara was treated for multiple myeloma in the mid-90s and had a stem cell transplant seven years ago. When I asked her husband how she was doing, he said, “Pretty well … just the gift of a little edema in one arm and some neuropathy in her feet.” On one hand you think, “Hey! That’s great! Those little gifts — those side effects — are a small price to pay.& ... more | | Posted By Jessie Gruman, founder and president, Center for Advancing Health At 9/26/2013 11:34:51 AM |
| How fear affects cancer survivorship |  A recent Wall Street Journal article about how post-traumatic stress syndrome can be caused by cancer and stroke brought to mind the variety of responses many people experience in response to cancer diagnosis and treatment. The lingering intensity of those responses – physical, psychological, social and behavioral – can affect whether and how we attend to the ta ... more | | Posted By Jessie Gruman, founder and president, Center for Advancing Health At 8/22/2013 10:01:24 AM |
| Is your hospital leader committed to patient-centered care? |  Nearly every hospital leader in America will tell you their hospital is all about patient-centered care. Of course, we know this isn’t true in many cases, especially when it comes to hospital capacity management. Though many institutions will deny to its last dying breath that they have any priorities that supercede patient care, nearly all do. They usually go like this: first priority is high margin surgical cases; second priority is high margin cardiac cases; third pri ... more | | Posted By Robbin Dick, MD | Policy | July 11, 2013 At 7/15/2013 11:02:17 AM |
| Life, Interrupted: Making Resolutions |  In my darkest days in the oncology unit, I promised myself that if I ever got into remission one day, I would become a stronger, healthier and better version of my precancer self. What could be a bigger inspiration to live a healthier life than surviving cancer? I imagined that once and for all I was going to become the kind of person who meditates every morning, guzzles green juice, does yoga and, on occasion, even runs a marathon. Before my diagnosis with leukemia, two years ... more | | Posted By By SULEIKA JAOUAD At 7/11/2013 4:06:09 PM |
| What’s scarier than a colonoscopy? |  Colorectal cancer. Shudder. That’s the knee-jerk response that most of my patients give me when mention of their 50th birthday creeps into the conversation and I reveal that it is time for their screening colonoscopy. Admittedly, a colonoscopy is not an experience that the overwhelming majority of the human race embraces with excitement and anticipation. Instead, it is a life event that is filled with dread, fear, annoyance, avoidance, and any other unse ... more | | Posted By Sophie M. Balzora, MD | Conditions | May 27, 2013 At 6/2/2013 11:30:18 AM |
| When patients rely on financial assistance programs for drugs |  I had been laid off a few months when my ulcerative colitis kicked in, and my doctor and I struggled to get it under control. After trying a variety of medicines, my health continued to deteriorate and I agreed to take Remicade. Remicade is a potent drug, administered through an IV infusion at the oncology center that comes with a whole host of potential side effects. The dosage requires an initial cycle of 4 infusions spaced several weeks apart, then a maintenance ... more | | Posted By Nancy Meredith At 5/23/2013 3:26:27 PM |
| Our Feel-Good War on Breast Cancer |  I used to believe that a mammogram saved my life. I even wrote that in the pages of this magazine. It was 1996, and I had just turned 35 when my doctor sent me for an initial screening — a relatively common practice at the time — that would serve as a base line when I began annual mammograms at 40. I had no family history of breast cancer, no particular risk factors for the disease. So when the radiologist found an odd, bicycle-spoke-like pattern ... more | | Posted By Peggy Orenstein, NYT At 4/28/2013 7:41:04 PM |
| Life, Interrupted: A Chat With Suleika |  It was just about a year ago when Well readers first met Suleika Jaouad, who at 22 was facing a cancer diagnosis and a potentially lifesaving bone marrow transplant. Her first column “Life, Interrupted: Facing Cancer in Your 20s,” captivated readers and transformed Ms. Jaouad from an unknown writer to a national advocate for young people with cancer. Although Ms. Jaou ... more | | Posted By By TARA PARKER-POPE At 4/18/2013 9:45:00 PM |
| For a Sick Friend: First, Do No Harm Conversing with the ill can be awkward, but keeping a few simple commandments makes a huge difference |  'A closed mouth gathers no feet." It's a charming axiom, but silence isn't always an option when we're dealing with a friend who's sick or in despair. The natural human reaction is to fee ... more | | Posted By Letty Cottin Pogrebin At 4/17/2013 8:57:05 PM |
| Beware of hidden agendas in cancer support groups |  My husband likes to say, “No good deed goes unpunished.” I don’t always agree, but sometimes you just can’t argue that concept. One of my favorite patients, a forty nine year old woman who I treated for head and neck cancer a year ago is a good case in point. Head and neck cancer is on the rise, and is linked, like cervical cancer, to infection with human papilloma virus which is sexually transmitted. Patients who are treated for this type o ... more | | Posted By Miranda Fielding, MD At 4/13/2013 12:52:08 PM |
| A Plan To Fix Cancer Care |  This year, more than 1.6 million Americans — 0.5 percent of the population — will receive a diagnosis of cancer. Their treatment will consume at least 5 percent of the country’s health care spending, at a cost that is growing faster than all other areas of medicine. Doctors and patients recognize that this is unsustainable and that we need to change the way we deliver care. But we need help, and that is why more than 20 prominent members of the oncology commu ... more | | Posted By By EZEKIEL J. EMANUEL At 3/26/2013 8:12:50 AM |
| The evolution of writing during a cancer journey |  As we embark on our cancer journey, writing can be a way to help us understand, work out issues, and help us accept and come to terms with our fate. The wide variety of blogs and discussion fora, whether religious or secular in outlook, optimistic or pessimistic in tone, medical or emotional in emphasis, all reflect the richness of our individual lives, circumstances and perspectives. My cancer journey was no different. As my journey progressed, so did my ‘writing journe ... more | | Posted By by Andrew Griffith on March 16, 2013 in Patient At 3/21/2013 8:35:04 AM |
| Do most patients with cancer receive proper prescriptions for pain? |  To state the obvious: 1) most advanced cancer patients have pain, and 2) we have excellent pain medications which can effectively treat more than 90% of cancer pain. Therefore, most patients with cancer receive proper prescriptions for pain. Obvious, yes? True? No. In Europe, Australia and North America narcotic analgesics are widely available, and frequently prescribed. While there is access, many patients, particularly those in certain groups such as senior ... more | | Posted By James C. Salwitz, MD At 3/5/2013 9:13:48 AM | | 795 Comments | Post a Comment |
| 'Cancer Prevention Tips' to Avoid |  If you want to reduce your cancer risks, be careful what advice you follow. A number of activist groups offer a range of cancer-fighting tips that don't mesh with the National Cancer Institute's (NCI) latest report on cancer trends. For example, the Breast Cancer Fund explains on its website: "It's clear that our exposures to toxic chemi ... more | | Posted By Angela Logomasini, Ph.D. At 2/23/2013 4:01:32 PM | | 1163 Comments | Post a Comment |
| Finding Poetry in Cancer |  When Kyle Potvin learned she had breast cancer at the age of 41, she tracked the details of her illness and treatment in a journal. But when it came to grappling with issues of mortality, fear and hope, she found that her best outlet was poetry.
How I feared chemo, afraid
It would change me.
It did.
Something dissolved inside me.
Tears began a slow drip;
I cried at the news story
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| | Posted By By TARA PARKER-POPE At 2/5/2013 6:55:27 PM | | 25 Comments | Post a Comment |
| 6 Tips For Getting Your Doctor to Listen to You | 
6 Tips For Getting Your Doctor to Listen to You
By Dr. Leana S. Wen
Have you ever gone to the doctor and felt like he wasn’t listening to you?
Have you tried to tell your story, only to have him interrupt with a checklist of questions: do you have chest ...more
| | Posted By Dr. Leana S. Wen, M.D. At 2/3/2013 7:36:25 PM | | 36 Comments | Post a Comment |
| Deciding About Breast Cancer Chemotherapy |  As if being diagnosed with breast cancer wasn’t bad enough, many women with this diagnosis face complicated decisions about what kind of medicine or chemotherapy to take, if any, to reduce their chance of cancer recurrence. As I discussed in a recent post, the mathematics of such decisions can be hard to comprehend for many patients. But given that the right choice often depends on patient pre ... more | | Posted By Peter Ubel. MD At 1/28/2013 5:35:52 PM | | 47 Comments | Post a Comment |
| How to get the most out of your oncology appointments |  As a patient, you’re entitled to ask your health care providers anything. In that sense, there are no bad questions. But some questions will help you get more out of your interaction with your health care providers than others. This advice comes from my experience as a medical oncologist and a cancer survivor. Before asking your questions, remember that you’re dealing with a human being. Doctors are not gods or saints. We try to remain professional, but ... more | | Posted By Naoto Ueno, MD, PhD At 1/7/2013 10:10:48 AM | | 376 Comments | Post a Comment |
| Love Doesn't Get Cancer |  I'm letting the bad cat out of the bag. My husband has terminal cancer. I don't say that word much, terminal. It sounds defeatist. When the oncologist says there is no cure, or the radiologist says we're just administering palliative care, I try and ignore the offending phrase. But the real truth is there is no cure. The definition of palliative is to treat the symptoms and pain without dealing with the underlying cause. Cancer is a nasty, nasty beast. But we are l ... more | | Posted By Judy Silk At 12/29/2012 8:49:52 AM | | 46 Comments | Post a Comment |
| Living With Cancer: The Husks |  Before I travel to my mother’s funeral, I need to deliver the husks of a week’s-worth of blister packs to the Indiana University Simon Cancer Center. Every Tuesday I bring the empty packets in a paper bag to be exchanged for the next week’s-worth of pills. After a number of tests, the nurse-administrator of the clinical trial reminds me to down four capsules in the airport and not to eat until I get inside the nonstop plane taking me toward the cemetery, where my father ... more | | Posted By By SUSAN GUBAR,December 7, 2012, At 12/10/2012 10:11:28 PM | | 33 Comments | Post a Comment |
| The obstacles patients face in making the right decisions |  New York Times columnist Nicholas D. Kristof wrote a heartfelt piece “ A Possibly Fatal Mistake” about his college roommate Scott Androes, who recently was diagnosed with metastatic prostate cancer. His story illustrates the problem with the current health care system. It isn’t about the lack of health insurance. It&rsquo ... more | | Posted By Davis Liu, MD At 11/19/2012 9:10:31 AM | | 21 Comments | Post a Comment |
| "Chemocation": A Comedian Talks Work & Cancer |  I went to Fatburger immediately after finding out my testicular cancer diagnosis. Fatburger is one of my personal stages of grief, don’t hate. The first person I called was my mother (duh), then my best friend (double duh), and finally my boss. Getting cancer sends a cascade of details into your life you never expected. The time commitment it requires makes it a second job. It’s the worst paying job you’ll ever have. In fact, you’re paying for it! ... more | | Posted By H. Alan Scott At 11/7/2012 5:11:35 PM | | 25 Comments | Post a Comment |
| Life in Limbo Land: Waiting to get booted from the cancer club | 
By Diane Mapes
There's nothing like having cancer to make you appreciate the little things in life -- like buying shampoo, running a few miles or being able to forget the address of the hospital where you were treated. After I was diagnosed with breast cancer in February 2011, I felt like I lived at that hospital. Today -- a year out from treatment -- it's in the rear view mirror, along with the Posted By Diane Mapes At 10/30/2012 12:06:46 PM | | 621 Comments | Post a Comment |
| I Got This From You |  I come from a very small family. My mother had one brother, David and my father had one sister, Jill. Uncle David li ... more | | Posted By Guest Blogger - Jody Wenke At 10/25/2012 2:42:06 PM | | 43 Comments | Post a Comment |
| It’s not all in the genes: How to reduce your risk of cancer |  There are an estimated 1,638,910 new cases of the dreadful disease diagnosed in 2012 in the United States, not including non-melanoma skin cancers. Cancer is not just one disease but is a term that represents more than 100 diseases with different causes. The basic unit of life is cells, and cancer always begins in cells. When the normal process of cell growth and division is altered, these abnormal cells divide without control and can form tumors and invade nearby tissue. It i ... more | | Posted By by Toni Brayer, MD on October 22nd, 2012 in Conditions At 10/25/2012 9:09:25 AM | | 1071 Comments | Post a Comment |
| Cancer Is About Relationships -- Get Personal |  Life is an emergent property, something more than the sum of its parts, the irreducible product of complex relationships between inanimate components. After all, we are made of the same stuff as the dead matter around us. But how are we so different? An analysis of our bodies the minute before versus the minute after we die would not show many differences in our atomic, molecular and cellular composition. But the relational status at every level of organization would be drastically differ ... more | | Posted By Joaquin M. Espinosa, Assoc. Professor of Molecular, Cellular and Developmental Biology, University of Colorado Boulder At 10/23/2012 11:15:11 AM | | 37 Comments | Post a Comment |
| Plan your return home after a long hospital stay |  Just as preparing for a lengthy hospital stay requires planning, so does returning to home after the hospital. While your condition and strength will shape the best approach for you, my experience following my stem cell transplants may be helpful should you find yourself in this situation. Before you leave get the information you need. Most hospitals are pretty good in providing written information sheets on follow-up care, related instructions, and warn ... more | | Posted By by Andrew Griffith on October 15th, 2012 in Patient At 10/18/2012 11:34:48 AM | | 35 Comments | Post a Comment |
| A Cancer Patient’s Best Friend |  When I was growing up, my dream was to one day become a veterinarian. In fourth and fifth grade, I volunteered every day after school at a veterinarian’s clinic. I didn’t view it as an “internship” — in my mind, I was apprenticing for a certain future in the field. When I was 10, I asked for an incubator for Christmas. By spring, I was carting around a dozen baby chicks in my purple doll stroller. In middle school I walked dogs at the local animal shelter. Bu ... more | | Posted By By SULEIKA JAOUAD September 27, 2012, 1:04 pm At 10/8/2012 12:54:24 PM | | 885 Comments | Post a Comment |
| Needles or Port? A Cancer Patient Decides |  The first question many cancer patients are asked at a doctor’s office or an infusion center is “Do you have a port?” I shake my head no, but add the words “not yet.” To port or not to port: That is the question facing me when I arrive on the hospital hall dedicated to clinical trials. “They are tiny and rollers,” the nurse says as his fingertips trace the veins on my arms. My part in a trial has begun, but the only “good” ... more | | Posted By By SUSAN GUBAR Sept. 20, 2012, 12:08 pm At 9/24/2012 4:37:07 PM | | 681 Comments | Post a Comment |
| 5 ways to help make a cancer diagnosis more manageable |  Over the past few years, I have had more than my share of navigating my way through the emotional and practical aspects of my treatment for mantle cell lymphoma. While at the back of my mind the broader questions – why me?, how long will I live? – remain, once I got over the initial anger and depression after the initial diagnosis (and after my relapse), I found these practical tips and approaches helped me and my family get through it all: more | | Posted By by Andrew Griffith on September 22nd, 2012 in PATIENT At 9/24/2012 9:34:20 AM | | 23 Comments | Post a Comment |
| Life, Interrupted: Five Days of Chemo |  August 30, 2012, 12:01 am Day 1 | | Posted By By SULEIKA JAOUAD At 9/19/2012 12:07:53 PM | | 21 Comments | Post a Comment |
| Gratitude for cancer research |  It isn't often, as a cancer survivor, that I get to thank those who are working behind the scenes to extend my life and to someday discover a cure for cancer. I had that great opportunity today, thanks to Ellen Stovall and National Coalition for Cancer Survivorship. It was a wonderful privilege and rare treat to sit before a room full of Pfizer researchers and scientists who have dedicated their time and lives to advancing personalized medicine in cancer care. I shared my ... more | | Posted By BY SUZANNE LINDLEY | SEPTEMBER 16, 2012 At 9/18/2012 10:18:02 AM | | 57 Comments | Post a Comment |
| Coping with Liver Cancer - A cancer diagnosis can remind you to treasure life. |  September 1, 2012, Volume 3, Issue 13 The ASCO Post
From the moment I had a partial hysterectomy in 2010, I started having unexplained bouts of nausea. My surgeon and even my primary care physician chalked it up to everything from the difficult 6-hour surgery I had just had to anxiety over a move I’d recently made from Connecticut to North Carolina. But after 8 months went by and I still had no relief, I k ...more
| | Posted By By Margaret Brandt, as told to Jo Cavallo At 9/12/2012 11:56:28 AM | | 806 Comments | Post a Comment |
| Helpful things to say to someone who’s sick |  It’s easy for those with health problems to complain about what we don’t want to hear others say to us, but I thought it might be helpful to let others know what we wish they would say to us. “You look so good, but how are you really feeling?” It’s hard for us to respond to comments like, “You look so good” (or the always dreaded, “But you don’t look sick”) becau ... more | | Posted By by Toni Bernhard, JD At 8/27/2012 8:46:42 AM | | 31 Comments | Post a Comment |
| Life, Interrupted: Six Ways to Cope With Cancer |  People are always giving advice to cancer patients. Whether it is nutritional advice or doctor recommendations or tips on how to quell the nausea that accompanies chemotherapy, just as soon as people hear you are sick they usually want to find a way to help. Most of the advice is welcome and encouraging, though in some cases you’re just not in the mood to hear what someone has learned because you’re too busy treading water. That’s one reason I hesitate to len ... more | | Posted By By SULEIKA JAOUAD At 8/23/2012 10:39:45 PM | | 981 Comments | Post a Comment |
| Googling cancer information: Tips from a cancer survivor | 
When I got my phone call with the diagnosis of mantle cell lymphoma (MCL), my instinct, like so many of us, was to Google. Today, 3 years later, I have learned about what to look for, what to avoid, and how to manage my natural wish to know as much as possible.
The following are suggestions to help others faced with a cancer diagnosis.
Google wisely. Google (and Wikipedia) are a ...more | | Posted By by Andrew Griffith At 8/20/2012 11:27:22 AM | | 3 Comments | Post a Comment |
| 5 questions every patient needs to ask | 
I once had a patient in whom I found a small breast lump. She was only thirty-two, and the lump was soft, non-tender, and mobile. But it was new. She examined her breasts monthly and was certain that she hadn’t felt it the month before. And she had a family history of breast cancer.
So, I asked myself, what to do? Her age—as well as the lump’s characteristics on exam—made the likelihoo ...more | | Posted By Alex Lickerman, MD At 7/30/2012 10:15:11 AM | | 33 Comments | Post a Comment |
| What is the goal of palliative care? |
Most of us do not want to die in the ICU tethered to tubes — not the quality of life we expect. Yet only 30 percent of us have made arrangements to prevent this from happening. Death and dying is a tough subject for us to broach. Be aware that very few of us will die in our sleep — most have a slow sometimes excruciating decline to death.
As we get older it becomes important to have a family discussion abou ...more | | Posted By by Jeffrey I. Kreisberg, PhD | in Physician At 7/23/2012 9:56:14 AM | | 2 Comments | Post a Comment |
| Skin cancer on the rise in young women -- how to prevent it |  By April Daniels Husser SELF Who doesn't love a sun-kissed glow? These days, however, you're much better off getting your color from a bottle or a great bronzer, because despite all the products with SPF at our disposal -- and all the info out there about the& ... more | | Posted By April Daniels Husser At 7/19/2012 5:23:17 PM | | 295 Comments | Post a Comment |
| The Things I Wish I Were Told When I Was Diagnosed With Cancer |  The Things I Wish I Were Told When I Was Diagnosed With Cancer: Your relationships are about to change. All of them. Some will get stronger. They will probably not be with the people you would expect. The people you want to handle this well might not be able to for a variety of reasons. Some of the reasons will be selfish. Some of them will be entirely innocent and circumstantial. All of them will be forgivable because no on ... more | | Posted By Jeff Tomczek At 7/18/2012 11:53:17 AM | | 252 Comments | Post a Comment |
| Things I Wish I Knew Before My Lumpectomy |  Before I underwent lumpectomy in 2002, I wish I had known that: My cancer would return 6 years later. They were going to inject wires and a blue dye into my breast and it would hurt, and the blue dye would not go away for months after my surgery. If my cancer ever came back, the fact that I had a Posted By Suzette Lipscomb At 4/19/2012 5:28:47 AM |
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