Patients often assume that when their treatments are over, their fatigue will be over. It is not so, said David Spiegel, M.D., of Stanford University School of Medicine. We are fortunate that we live in a time when cancer survivorship is an issue. However, late effects of therapy can come as a surprise.

In a study of Hodgkin's disease survivors, fatigue persisted into the 9th year after treatment. Depression and sexual problems are also common. Spiegel found that 30% of Hodgkin's disease survivors were depressed at 1 year. The patients most likely to have psychosocial problems, said Spiegel, are those with greater severity of initial treatment or side effects, and those who have a relapse.

Although researchers have begun to tackle these issues, the gaps in knowledge of the long term effects of surviving cancer can be frustrating to survivors themselves, and to practitioners. At a recent meeting sponsored by the Office of Cancer Survivorship of the National Cancer Institute, survivors, and survivorship specialists brought diverse viewpoints to a discussion of cancer survivorship and it's challenges. As Anna Meadows, M.D., Director of the Office of Cancer Survivorship stated, "We need to know what survivors are dealing with so that changes can be made in treatment options that will lead to a better quality of survival".

Excerpts taken from an article written by: Maggie Reh Journal of the National Cancer Institute, Vol. 90, No.8, April 15, 1998