CANCERTALK

Prof Rob Newton is a world leader in pioneering Exercise Oncology, destroying previous misconceptions about the need for rest in the face of physically challenging treatments like radiotherapy or chemotherapy, or when faced with common symptoms such as fatigue, low mood or the inability to sleep, with rigorous trial data demonstrating significant improvements in quality of life and substantial cost savings. More recently, the science is demonstrating that exercise really is great medicine for cancer, worthy of equal consideration alongside the best treatments that modern medicine has offer as a means of extending lives.

It’s no secret that GPs in the UK are working under extreme pressure and with little job satisfaction. The ludicrously short consultation times create a conveyor belt of ‘cases’ with no opportunity to build relationships or trust, elements that are fundamental to the healing interchange between practitioner and patient. They know that despite doing their very best, they are merely applying sticking plasters to the complex, deep-seated problems that many of their patients face. This situation prompted Dr Katy Stephen to broaden her training and adopt situations in which she is able to spend more time and give her best advice – which doesn’t concern any complex medical interventions, but gets back to the ‘basics’ of health.The episode takes in a broad discussion of the rise in complex chronic health conditions, including cancer, and of the potential for a greater role for GPs in cancer care.

Dr Dominique Lee has set out to bring change to the working environment of doctors and other healthcare workers. Raw personal experience provides her with the impetus for this initiative, and she is certain that until healthcare has a more caring and respectful culture, abuse and poor practice will prevail, good practitioners will continue to leave, and patients will continue receiving care that falls well short of their needs.

The culture of men in the UK is such that they are very unlikely to pursue any kind of supportive therapies. When it comes to healthcare, the stiff upper lip persists. However, a recommendation and delivery of auricular acupuncture for a range of unpleasant symptoms, when given by Philip Reynolds Consultant Therapeutic Radiographer to men with prostate cancer, results in a surprisingly high take up.

In recognition of the need for fundamental changes to our NHS, the government has launched Change NHS as a means to garner input from both the public and other organisations. For this episode we hear from two people with a lot to say about cancer care in the NHS: firstly Chris Lewis, outspoken patient advocate and founder of SIMPal, a charity set up to tackle cancer poverty, and secondly Versha Carter, currently receiving cancer treatment, but also the force behind the hugely successful Integrative & Personalised Medicine Congress, someone with a broad perspective on her own cancer care options.

Dr Sarah Partridge is a Clinical Oncologist specialising in head and neck cancers. She also has an abiding interest in mind-body therapies which has led her to train in Clinical Hypnosis. She finds this therapy to be an enormous resource as an alternative or adjunct to conventional methods of managing pain, stress, phobic reactions and more. She has already demonstrated its capacity to save healthcare costs in meaningful ways, and with her clinical experience backed up by all the evidence for its efficacy, Dr Partridge is in no doubt that Clinical Hypnosis has an important role to play in oncology.

Dr Deepak Ravindran is a Consultant in Pain Medicine and an Honorary Professor at Teesside University, with 20 years' experience playing leading roles in the NHS. He is pioneering fresh non-drug approaches to pain management that, alongside traditional methods such as drugs, surgery or ablation, espouse a range of complementary and lifestyle modalities that have been shown to be effective. Dr Ravindran highlights flawed thinking in regard to the nature of pain and the overpowering fear factors around pain as obstacles to a different style of management in which the provision of a safe space allows pain to subside naturally. Website: https://deepakravindran.co.uk/ Book: https://deepakravindran.co.uk/book/

Professor Lacey has been in the vanguard of developing Integrative Oncology in Australia. She is Director of Supportive Care and Integrative Oncology at the LivingRoom at Chris O’Brien Lifehouse in Sydney. With  20 years' experience as a palliative and supportive care specialist, she has dedicated the last decade to developments in Integrative Oncology, integrating  evidence-based complementary and lifestyle therapies with conventional treatments to provide 'whole person' care. In this episode she shares some of the successes and challenges of introducing new practices into cancer care.

Professor Robert Thomas is well know for his pioneering work trialling natural agents for use in cancer care and also for his books, including the recent 'How to Live'. Alongside his work as clinical oncologist, he has now been appointed to lead the oncology side of services at the Royal London Hospital for Integrated Medicine, for which he has some ambitious plans.

Dr Nasha Winters, herself a very long-term survivor of teenage cancer with a dire prognosis, is on a mission to make metabolic treatment of cancer available everywhere. Her rigorous approach to managing cancer is underpinned by her firm opinion that it is only by leaving all protocol-driven methodologies behind and espousing truly personalised care that long term remissions with good quality of life can be consistently delivered.

Santhosshi Narayanan MD is deeply involved in the development of Integrative Oncology at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, Texas, where she is currently an Associate Professor in the Department of Palliative, Rehabilitative and Integrative Medicine. Dr Narayanan explains the services now on offer to those with cancer, the way these interface with conventional oncology services, and the impact that an integrative programme can have on patient experience and outcome. She also looks to the future and the additional services now in development.

Surgical Oncologist and Cancer Researcher Dr Emma Davies found herself thrust into the unenviable position of carer for her partner who had been diagnosed with an aggressive stage IV cancer. While always having more than a passing interest in a wider view of healthcare, this development pushed her to take a deep dive into the wealth of resources within Integrative Medicine available to help her wife in these extremely difficult circumstances. What she found has made a world of difference to them both: "This has all of the evidence behind it, it’s all positive things, it has no detrimental effects to her health, improved her quality of life… all people need to know about this."

Joshila DeVile has been deeply involved in the exercise revolution that has overturned previous thinking in regards to cancer, and provided patients with a potent tool for self help – one that every patient deserves to be equipped with.

Kiki Marselou is an experienced pharmacist who decided to broaden her healthcare skills by training in nutrition and homeopathy, enabling her to support patients from the inclusive position of having a foot firmly in both camps.

Passionate about oncology and about the power of integration, Konstantina Stylianou returned to Cyprus from her studies and experience overseas, and has quickly and significantly affected the culture of the hospital where she works, to embrace a more integrative approach.

Dr Lucy Gossage is an NHS Oncologist, but also a highly respected sportswoman, with a trail of prestigious achievements. She has come to appreciate the significant benefits of exercise for those with cancer, particularly when undergoing treatment. Besides encouraging her own patients to engage, she is involved in charity work to bring the good news of the benefits of exercise to many more people with cancer across the UK.

The remarkable success that Gilly Bertram achieved in recovering fully from a life-threatening astrocytoma - through the judicious use of nutritional therapy and other lifestyle approaches alongside her conventional care - led her to train in nutritional therapy and to focus her work on supporting others with cancer. Gilly discusses the role of integrative approaches in relation to conventional care with CANCERTALK hosts Dr Penny Kechagioglou and Robin Daly.

With the spiralling number of people affected by chronic conditions resulting from lifestyle, Health Coaching is becoming an increasingly vital element of Healthcare. Prescribing lifestyle change is simple - adoption of those changes is quite another matter, and specialised support is absolutely essential for most patients. Izabella Natrins, CEO of UKI Health Coaching Association, talks to podcast hosts Senior Oncologist Penny Kehagioglou and Robin Daly about the work of the Association, which aims to embed health coaching firmly within UK healthcare.

Dr Victor Barley was a Consultant Oncologist and former Lead Clinician of Avon, Somerset and Wiltshire Cancer Services Network. Over a long career he  developed a passion for integration which had its roots in his early experience of the gaps in care within the impersonal, mechanistic model of healthcare that prevailed at that time. Now retired, Dr Barley continues to look for ways to improve the experience of oncology patients by pushing for more patent-led, patient-centric cancer care in his role as Trustee of Penny Brohn UK.

Dr Robin Youngson trained as an anaesthesiologist in the UK and worked for more than twenty years in New Zealand, becoming an advisor to the NZ government and the World Health Organization on patient safety and strategies for putting people at the centre of healthcare. His passion is re-humanising healthcare and strengthening caring and compassion, and this led him to found the international HEARTS in HEALTHCARE movement, and to write Time to Care, eventually prompting him to leave mainstream healthcare altogether to pursue a relatively new technique which he finds brings rapid help to patients with long-term conditions, in a way that's not currently possible through conventional medicine.