KEY CONCEPTS: QoL= Quality of Life. HPA = Hypothalamic Pituitary Adrenal axis. SOC = Sense of Coherence. CRF = Cancer Related Fatigue. PNI = Psychoneuroimmunology. RCT/RT = Random Controlled Tests / Controlled Tests. TCQ= Tai Chi/Qigong
One’s cancer identification produces an enormous stress. With its diagnosis comes surprise and stigmatic condemnation1 Your life’s future is in the hands of fate and medicine.
While treatment varies according to the diagnostic presentation and systems methodology, it usually excludes personal participation or evaluation. It, like cancer, is done to you. While the doctors remove or obliterate an identified pathogen in you, your psycho-social reality is overlooked.
While western medicine is good at emergency treatments it overlooks comprehensive care. The human experiences accompanying the illness are neglected and displaced. The increasingly industrialisation of medicine loses quality in its transition2. There are many pertinent considerations outside laboratory evidence and categories.
Cancer related fatigue (CRF) and impaired immune system are amongst the most common symptoms3. Other than short term stress, having fatigue, distress or mood disorder further impairs the immune system which has a reciprocal feedback system4. Some conscious and unconscious human activity affects the immune system’s therapeutic capabilities5. This reduces “the best weapon we have for fighting cancer”6.
Treatment outcomes are affected by interplay between psychological and biological factors7. Included are elements of mental, physical, social, biochemical, genetic and environment issues. The cancer condition involves complex death and life situations for the sufferer and all associated.
What can be done to improve outcomes? Various interventions accessible to intentional actions will be explored in the subsequent sections.
- Illness as a Metaphor. (1978) S. Sontag. Cancer as metaphor (2004) R T Penson et al. Oncologist. 9(6) ↩︎
- The Spectrum of Harm Associated with Modern Medicine. (Aug21) Ami Schattner. J Gen Intern Med. 2;37(3) ↩︎
- Cancer-Related Fatigue Outcome Measures in Integrative Oncology. (2022) D. Gentile, & D Beeler. Oncology 36(5) ↩︎
- Effects of stress on immune function…. (2014 May) F S Dhabhar. Immunol Res. 58(2-3) ↩︎
- Cancer and the Immune System…. (June 2015) D Pardoll. Semin Oncol. 3;42(4). ↩︎
- Dr F. Mackay. University of Melbourne. http://monash.edu/news/show/fresh-hope-for-leukaemia-cure. Roles of the immune system in cancer: from tumor initiation to metastatic progression. 1Oct2018 Hugo Gonzalez. Genes Dev.32(19-20) ↩︎
- How Psychological Therapy May Prolong Survival in Cancer Patients: New Evidence and a Simple Theory. (2004) A. Cunningham. Integrative Cancer Therapies 3(3). High levels of untreated distress and fatigue in cancer patients. L E Carlson et al. 25May 2004. Br J Cancer. 90(12). Normalization of the Mini-MAC Questionnaire among Cancer Patients. A Czerw et al. (Nov2021) Int J Environ Res Public Health. 29:18. Exercise is medicine in oncology…. (3Aug22) K H Schmitz, et.al. CA Cancer Journal for Clinicians. 69:6. Associations of clinical and circulating metabolic biomarkers with low physical fitness and function in adults with chronic lymphocytic leukemia. 03Aug22. Andrea Sitlinger et.al. Front. Oncol.12. ↩︎
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