Canopy TV An Online News Channel For the Cancer Community From Canopy Cancer Care

Canopy TV is an online news channel for the cancer community, aiming to

provide interesting and topical information to cancer patients and their families, increase people’s understanding of cancer and showcase interesting clinical developments in cancer treatment.

Canopy TV is brought to you by Canopy Cancer Care, New Zealand’s leading private cancer care for adult patients. Canopy’s vision is to offer patients world class cancer care, delivered locally here in New Zealand.

In the first episode of Canopy TV, they explore some of the issues patients face in moving on with their lives once their treatment finishes. They also have a discussion with psychologist, Lucy Barnes and Oncologist, Dr Richard Sullivan, about female sexuality and treatment, and how to tell their children they have cancer, but in this article, we will concentrate on the difficulties arrising from ending your cancer treatment.

Many people find finishing their cancer treatment one of the more stressful times in their cancer journey, and this is something not commonly talked about. End of treatment can be a really stressful time, when you feel quite miserable and scared. At the end of treatment the support option drops off a little bit, so you do feel the loss of support from the medical team and the nursing team that you have been regularly seeing every week, and family and friends can also move on faster than you can.

Often patients’ family and friends can put pressure on you, in a way, as they expect you to bounce back and be the person you were before the treatment. You can often be left with side effects that take time to recover from, and it becomes the ‘new normal’

Recurrence is one of the biggest fears patients can feel when they finish treatment, which can put a lot of stress on you and your family and friends. If recurrence fears become overwhelming you should seek help, whether from your GP or calling your nurse specialist who can refer you to a psychologist, to help you manage those feelings.

For more information on cancer treatment, cancer clinics, cancer care and Canopy TV please go to http://www.canopycancercare.co.nz .