After being released from the care of oncologists, breast cancer survivors often go back to seeing primary care doctors who may possibly be unaware of the side effects of cancer treatment that patients go through.
Survivors themselves may not even know how huge the impact of treatments such as chemotherapy and radiation is on their overall well-being, experts said.
With that, two major cancer organizations in the United States collaborated to create comprehensive and clear health care guidelines for survivors of breast cancer.
The guidelines provide recommendations from the American Cancer Society and the American Society of Clinical Oncology to help primary care doctors and other clinicians manage and support female adult survivors of the disease. Known as the Breast Cancer Survivorship Guideline, it is now featured in the Journal of Clinical Oncology.
"More and more long-term care is being handled by non-oncologists, so both organizations thought it was important to offer guidance - a set of comprehensive recommendations to health care providers caring for patients with breast cancer," said Dr. Gary Lyman, an oncologist who contributed to the guidelines.
Primary care physicians previously relied on what Lyman called "piecemeal" information. These were multiple--and often confusing--recommendations by various professional organizations. The new guidelines reveal concise recommendations for survivorship.
For instance, breast cancer patients and survivors must be regularly monitored in the case of the return of the cancer. The patient's cancer history and physical examination must be evaluated, and the person should be screened for any new developments.
PCPs should also advise breast cancer survivors to follow a healthy lifestyle and adhere to endocrine therapy such as tamoxifen which is used to keep the cancer at bay. The patients should be monitored for any post-treatment symptoms which could endanger their quality of life.
The guidelines also revealed a number of issues that breast cancer survivors face such as memory and thinking problems, fatigue, body image and coordinating care issues.
Authors of the guidelines said that breast cancer survivors encounter significant issues regarding treatment, and that they deserve comprehensive and high-quality follow-up care in order to have a better quality of life.
Meanwhile, Lyman said that personalized follow-up care may also be effective as not all breast cancers are alike.
"It's the conversations," said Lyman, adding that clear communication between doctor and survivor is essential in survivorship.
