Advanced cancer: a mind-body-spirit approach to life and living

Authentic caring occasions for patients in hairy cell leukemia clinical trials

BACKGROUND

Rare diseases present challenges for patients, healthcare providers, and researchers. Rare disease communities exist for collaboration, dissemination of information, and to promote support for all community members. Patients with a rare disease desire to be supported through a rare disease community. Hairy cell leukemia (HCL) is a rare adult B-cell lymphocytic cancer that currently has no cure.

OBJECTIVES

Patients with relapsed or refractory HCL may need to consider participation in a clinical trial. The research nurse can initiate a planned caring occasion based on Watson's Theory of Human Caring. The purpose of the planned caring occasion for patients with HCL in clinical trials is to establish authentic intentional caring encounters between the research nurse and patients and meaningful caring encounters between patients.

OBSERVATIONS

Relapsed or refractory patients enrolled in an HCL clinical trial identify the trial as a microcommunity and the research nurse as an advocate and liaison. Patients seek support, empowerment, and the opportunity to connect with other patients with HCL. The planned caring occasion has the potential to provide a healing environment and facilitate shared experiences of living with HCL. The potential outcome for patients is strengthened holistic wellness.

Complementary and alternative medicine therapies as symptom management strategies for the late effects of breast cancer treatment

Advancements in breast cancer treatment continue to improve the likelihood of survival. The increase in survival has come at a cost, however; the late effects of breast cancer treatment have remained a constant reminder to women of what they have endured and require holistic nursing's attention. One area of nursing practice that might improve the condition of breast cancer survivors once their treatment has ended is complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) therapies. To provide guidance to nurses working with breast cancer survivors, a focused review of the literature exploring the symptomatology and prevalence of breast cancer's late effects as well as the use of CAM therapies to improve those effects is presented. Evidence suggests that CAM therapies have sometimes been incorporated into symptom management strategies currently employed; however, the evidential claims as a whole have been generally inconclusive, especially for complete resolution of the late effects. Regardless, a number of studies demonstrate a reduction of negative symptoms experienced with few to no side effects of CAM therapies.

Cancer Prevention and Therapy: Integrating Traditional Korean Medicine Into Modern Cancer Care

In spite of billions of dollars spent on cancer research each year, overall cancer incidence and cancer survival has not changed significantly in the last half century. Instead, the recent projection from the World Health Organization suggests that global cancer incidence and death is expected to double within the next decade. This requires an "out of the box" thinking approach. While traditional medicine used for thousands of years is safe and affordable, its efficacy and mechanism of action are not fully reported. Demonstrating that traditional medicine is efficacious and how it works can provide a "bed to bench" and "bench to bed" back approach toward prevention and treatment of cancer. This current review is an attempt to describe the contributions of traditional Korean medicine (TKM) to modern medicine and, in particular, cancer treatment. TKM suggests that cancer is an outcome of an imbalance of body, mind, and spirit; thus, it requires a multimodal treatment approach that involves lifestyle modification, herbal prescription, acupuncture, moxibustion, traditional exercise, and meditation to restore the balance. Old wisdoms in combination with modern science can find a new way to deal with the "emperor of all maladies."

Cancer patients' experiences of the early phase of individual counseling in an outpatient psycho-oncology setting

Distress is a common and substantive problem associated with the invasive nature of cancer. Psychosocial interventions can alleviate distress and enhance quality of life, with a wealth of research demonstrating benefits of group interventions. Less is known, however, about the value of individual psychological counseling for cancer patients. The goal of our study was to understand patients' experiences of attending an individual psycho-oncology counseling service in a comprehensive cancer center in Canada. We conducted six focus groups to ask patients about their perceived benefits of the early phase of counseling. The 23 participants were predominantly women living in urban areas who sought counseling for emotional and coping difficulties. Using inductive analysis, we identified four interrelated themes: distress and need for support, challenges to service access, service benefits, and the therapeutic encounter. The therapeutic encounter formed a core component of patients' experiences, highlighting the benefits of specific therapeutic interventions and processes.

Surviving cancer without compromising aspirations

This short paper is a reflection of how one person coped, survived and grew following numerous metastatic incidences over a 20 year period. Surviving cancer is a complex process but coping with the threat of regular recurrence has required a coping strategy that embraced the disease, set it aside and refused to compromise hopes, dreams and future life. Central to this personal journey has been the need to redefine normality, live with and set aside the fear of future metastases and death and find an answer and meaning in a changing biology, increased morbidity and possible mortality. This paper contends that not compromising the direction of travel and being able to focus on a career has ensured that survival was valuable and valued. A working environment in which students' problems have been immediate has produced different stressors. These have ultimately forced personal worries to be set aside, while living with cancer has become normal and accepted.