Rising to the medication's requirements: The experience of elderly cancer patients receiving palliative chemotherapy in the elective oncogeriatrics field

Publication date: Available online 8 October 2019Source: Social Science & MedicineAuthor(s): Rose-Anna Foley, Lucie Lechevalier Hurard, Annick Anchisi, Sandro AnchisiAbstractA new subfield of oncology has emerged in the last twenty years to raise awareness and address the specific needs of elderly cancer patients, a population that was long neglected in oncology. We sought to understand the individual experiences, as well as moral and social implications of considering elderly cancer patients as “treatable”.Following an anthropological critical interpretative approach focusing on practical and symbolic effects of chemotherapy in a rapidly evolving medical field, we conducted 20 semi-structured interviews and observations of medicine storage places at home among elderly cancer patients aged 70 and over in a clearly incurable situation receiving palliative chemotherapy. We used photographs representing paths as triggers in interviews, and compared the patients' views with those of 12 health professionals in oncology during a brief open-ended interview.Elderly cancer patients consider themselves to be survivors and fighters. Their long trajectory is a result of their successful struggle and tolerance of the treatments allowing them to carry on. They continually observe their physical ability and test their resistance, they resist complaining and are grateful to have cancer at a late stage of life. By highlighting their active life rather than the treatment inconveniences, th...
Source: Social Science and Medicine - Category: Psychiatry & Psychology Source Type: research