We call them “doctors’ orders.” You know, “Take these pills” or “Wear this splint.” It’s a terrible term. I prefer “doctors’ recommendations.”
Read moreTips for Dealing with "Losing Things" All the Time
It’s disruptive and distressing to lose things all the time, whether from cancer-related cognitive deficits, dementia, overload with life stress, grief, or any other reason. Here are some tips to decrease the risk of losing things
Read moreDealing with Losing Things
The challenges of life after cancer may include “losing things” all the time. This is not the occasional losing things of healthy busy people, but a pervasive problem with losing things throughout the day, every day.
Losing things can be a big deal during and after an illness like cancer. Besides disrupting your day, losing things may…
Read moreWendy's Eagles Helping Others Find Hope in 2019
What’s the big deal about yet another cancer walk? To answer, let me take you back to 1993.
Read moreHealthy Survivors' Hope for a Miracle
Is “hope for a miracle” a healing hope? The answer begins….
Read moreIn Praise of Gentleness
Susan Gubar opens her latest post on the NYTimes Living With Cancer blog with “I’ve been lucky that most of my care is delivered with tenderness.” The “most” signals…
Read moreCancer Taught Me to Help Patients Find Healing Hope
AS AN INTERNIST, I strived to give patients hope by prescribing therapies that increased their chance—their hope—of the best outcome and by encouraging them with hopeful words. My own hope was to care for patients until I was old.
Read moreArmchair Quarterbacking Paul Allen's Treatments
Patients with no firsthand knowledge of Paul Allen’s medical situation are offering explanations of what likely happened. On one blog, a follow-up commenter wondered if Allen’s doctors had made a mistake.
Read moreJudging Patients' Decisions
Seems everyone’s an expert these days, which can add to patients’ distress.
Read moreSusan Sayles: Nurse-survivor inspires Healthy Survivorship
After being a nurse for 22 years and an oncology nurse for 12, Susan Sayles, MS, RN, OCN, was diagnosed with breast cancer in 2015. Since completing her treatment, she’s been encouraging other breast cancer patients …
Read moreShould your doctor tell you if it might be cancer?
A physician's heart may be in the right place while reassuring a patient, "Don't worry. It'll be nothing." Unfortunately, trying to spare patients worry during evaluations can backfire. Patients who are reassured and then find out they have a serious illness may suffer from...
Read moreA Better Example of Joy due to Illness
In my last post, I used the example of a false alarm to illustrate how joy can come out of illness. That wasn't the best example, given how the joyful relief of a false alarm can be mixed with anger, embarrassment, self-doubt and other uncomfortable emotions.
Read moreHappiness Because of Illness
I don't like that I got cancer. Still, many good things have come out of the illness experience. Many joyful moments have happened because of my illness.
Read moreBeautiful Crutches
I must have been quite a sight, hobbling from display to display on crutches while taking my med-school anatomy final. I remember thinking how much I hated those crutches. Almost forty years later, I rely on a variety of crutches to manage aftereffects of past cancer therapies and (how great to write this) the effects of aging. I love each and every crutch.
Read moreScreening Tests and Healthy Survivors
I'm reading a popular new book that lambasts screening tests and the medical community that recommends them. Meanwhile, I just read an article put out by the University of Missouri, reporting "A team led by University of Missouri psychological science researchers has determined that patients may want cancer screenings even if the potential harms outweigh the benefits."
What is going on? Why would anyone abandon effective cancer screening tests? Why would anyone want screening tests they've been told are harmful and not helpful?
Read moreJulie Yip-Williams' Wisdom on Healthy Survivorship
An extraordinary woman offers wisdom to all us ordinary people. Colon cancer recently ended her life, but not before she left us words of wisdom in her blog and
Read moreAddressing Survivor Guilt
How do you deal with the uncomfortable emotion that may arise after someone else dies of the same disease you survived?
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