Side-Effects Endure Even After Cancer Treatments

According to the conclusions of a new study, it would appear that a lot of the people who are lucky enough to get cured of cancer with existing treatments tend to continue experiencing health problems.

The research showed that the most common issues related to chronic pain and fatigue, loss of sleep or poor sleep quality. These effects were found to span as much for as 3 to 5 years after the initial cancer treatment had been concluded.

The work was carried out by experts at the Northwestern University, in the United States, and was the largest, most comprehensive research carried out on this population subgroup to date.

Experts determined that cancer survivors are all very eager to return to their former, vital selves after treatment concludes. However, this usually does not happen right away, much to the disappointment of patients, friends, family and doctors alike.

The intensity of the issues people face ranges from moderate to severe, and this came as a shock to the research team. Scientists were also surprised to learn about how long the effects endured for.

“We were surprised to see how prevalent these symptoms still are. This is one of the first looks at what’s really happening for survivors in terms of symptoms and treatment among community-based treatment settings across the US,” says Lynne Wagner.

She holds an appointment as an associate professor of medical social sciences at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, and was a co-investigator of the new research effort.

The expert is also a clinical health psychologist at the Northwestern Robert H. Lurie Comprehensive Cancer Center. Details of the study were presented on June 4, at the 2011 annual meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology, in Chicago.

“We don’t have a great system to provide care to cancer survivors. Cancer survivors are left trying to put the pieces together to find optimal care,” Wagner explains, quoted by Science Blog.

“They ideally need to see someone who is knowledgeable about the long-term affects of treatment,” she says. Drugs are also a problem for this group, especially when it comes to controlled substances.

“It is acceptable for someone actively going through cancer treatment to have pain medications, but when they transition to being survivors, that acceptance goes away. If they ask for pain medication again, doctors may worry that they are getting addicted,” the expert concludes.