Supportive and Palliative Care in Cancer

Claud F B Regnard, Margaret Kindlen

Section 1: Cancer 1. What is cancer? 2. What causes cancer? 3. Types of cancer 4. Detecting cancer 5. Cancer diagnosis and monitoring Section 2: Cancer treatments 6. How is cancer treatment chosen? 7. Surgery 8. Radiotherapy: overview 9. Radiotherapy: side effects 10. Chemotherapy: overview 11. Chemotherapy: side effects 12. Hormone therapy Section 3: Supportive and palliative care 13. What is palliative care? 14. Principles of palliative care 15. Palliative care: who and when? Section 4: Cancer pain 16. What is pain? 17. What sorts of pain are there? 18. When a patient is in pain, what should I do? 19. Drugs used to treat pain 20. Isn't morphine dangerous? 21. What do I do if the pain is getting worse? Section 5: Symptoms 22. How can I help a patient who is constipated? 23. What can I do when a patient is nauseated or vomiting? 24. How can I help a breathless patient? 25. How can I help a patient with fatigue and weakness? 26. What can I do when a patient does not want to eat or drink? 27. Maintaining an environment for eating 28. How can I help the patient with mouth problems? Section 6: Communication 29. Why is communication so important? 30. What can I do to relieve a person's anxiety? 31. How do I answer a difficult question? 32. What about breaking bad or difficult news? 33. How can I help an angry person? 34. How can I help a withdrawn patient? 35. How can I help a confused patient? 36. Do children understand what is going on? 37. How does illness affect how we see ourselves? 38. Identifying distress when communication is poor Section 7: Dying and bereavement 39. What is loss and grief? 40. How can I support the patient, partner and relative? 41. How do I help with a dying patient's distress? 42. What do I do when a patient dies? 43. Death of a patient's friend or relative 44. Supporting staff after a patient has died 45. Complicated grief Section 8: Spirituality and equality 46. Fostering hope 47. What is spirituality? 48. How can I help someone with a different faith to mine? 49. How can I avoid discrimination?