Читать книгу Stay Healthy During Chemo - Джо Диспенза - Страница 16

There is such a thing as “chemo brain,” or “chemo head.” Do a search on the Internet for these terms and thousands of sites will come up. Although this has been a problem for cancer patients since the dawn of chemotherapy, the issue has only recently been named. It is now recognized as something that happens to most patients in chemo treatment, and it is being studied to see how it might be dealt with medically.

I mentioned this above as one of the side effects of chemotherapy. But it bears repeating in discussing the role of the caregiver. There is a wide range of estimates of how many people get chemo brain. Some experts tell us that, among people who receive chemo, between 15% and 70% will experience brain symptoms. Others put the upper limit of the range at 50%. Working with these numbers, the risk of chemo brain can be higher than 1 out of 2 or as low as 1 in 6.

According to the American Cancer Society, patients with chemo brain experience these symptoms:

 They forget things that they usually have no trouble recalling (memory lapses).

 They have trouble concentrating (can't focus on what they're doing, have a short attention span, may “space out”).

 They will have trouble remembering details like names, dates, and sometimes larger events.

 There will be problems in multi-tasking, such as answering the phone while cooking, without losing track of one task (they are less able to do more than one thing at a time).

 They take longer to finish things (disorganized, slower at thinking and processing).

 There will be problems remembering common words (unable to find the right words to finish a sentence).

The American Cancer Society goes on to say that:

“For most people, chemo brain effects happen quickly and only last a short time. Others have long-term mental changes. Usually the changes that patients notice are very subtle, and others around them may not even notice any changes at all. Still, the people who are having problems are well aware of the differences in their thinking. Many people do not tell their cancer care team about this problem until it affects their everyday life.”

Many cancer patients are embarrassed about chemo brain and try to cover up their forgetfulness and fuzzy thinking. At the heart of the matter is how the condition, temporary or not, can affect a patient's care. All too often, chemo brain will interfere with treatment because a patient forgets to take medications or gets confused about other aspects of treatment, including missing doctor appointments.

The need for a caregiver should be obvious, given the prevalence of chemo brain. Even a cancer patient who is not plagued with the extremes of this problem will have trouble remembering everything that has to be done during treatment, including the number and timing of medications, meetings with the oncologist and other medical specialists, getting scans and blood tests, fasting before certain examinations, filling prescriptions, and so on.

I believe that caregivers are a special breed of people, and their work is a spiritual practice. If a cancer patient is lucky, there will be a life-partner, family member, or friend who will be there to help. Assistance is necessary not only for the strictly medical reasons I mentioned, but also to keep track of the health-building program that augments chemotherapy. Without a trusted helper working side-by-side with the cancer patient, the healing journey will be long, arduous, and perilous. With the caregiver sharing the responsibility for recovery, that journey becomes a shared experience of combined intention, a comfort for each, and even a joy.