October 12, 2018

How to Stay Mentally and Emotionally Resilient

Mental health goes hand-in-hand with physical health, and maintaining optimism, hope and psychological resilience during cancer treatment and after can improve your quality of life and your physical health outcomes. Both cancer patients and their caregivers face considerable emotional stress and strain, which is why David Wakefield, PhD, a licensed psychologist and mind-body therapist at […]

March 13, 2018

Why Sleep Should Be a Priority for Cancer Patients

Most people experience poor sleep from time to time. Maybe you went to bed too late, were too excited or stressed to fall asleep, took medication that kept you alert or had an alcoholic beverage before bed that interfered with your ability to fall asleep. There are many reasons that you might have a bad […]

February 12, 2018

Banding Together through Cancer with Music Therapy

Patients don’t need to know how to play an instrument to participate in the Music Therapy program currently offered at Cancer Treatment Centers of America® (CTCA) at Southwestern Regional Medical Center (Southwestern) in Tulsa, Oklahoma. They don’t even need to be musically inclined, according to Dr. David Wakefield, PhD, mind-body therapist at Southwestern. “Some patients […]

January 10, 2018

Why You Need to Be Kinder to Yourself and How to Do It

The party’s over, the guests have gone home, and the decorations are back in storage. The new year has arrived, and for many of us, 2018 offers a new chance to make good on that perennial list of resolutions that fell by the wayside last year. If you’re resolving to lose weight, exercise more, save […]

January 10, 2018

What to Know Before Visiting the Salon

A visit to the salon can brighten anyone’s day, but for cancer patients, salon services can do far more. From boosting self-esteem to empowering patients with a more positive outlook, a trip to the salon offers benefits that are more than skin deep. In fact, in a survey of U.S. women, 97 percent of those […]

December 10, 2017

3 Tips for Dealing with Information Overload

A cancer diagnosis often comes with an overwhelming amount of information for patients to sift through and remember. Between appointments, meeting with various doctors and clinicians, and digesting treatment and nutrition information, it can be difficult to keep track of it all. There’s so much to focus on at a time when you’re dealing with […]

October 9, 2017

5 Tips to Improve Self-Image

Cancer treatments can do a number on more than the disease. Many times, they also take a toll on patients physically and emotionally, causing pain, hair loss, lethargy, anxiety and other side effects that impact patients’ quality of life. Chemotherapy, for example, targets cells that grow quickly, including healthy cells in the skin, hair and nails. […]

September 8, 2017

It’s Not Always About Sex

When you hear the word “intimacy,” you may immediately think of sex. But the term actually has a much broader definition that includes emotional connections, bonding time and other aspects of the relationship. Having a healthy level of intimacy is important for any couple, but it may be especially key to couples dealing with cancer, […]

June 11, 2017

Can Playing Video Games Help Cancer Patients?

Playing a video game requires mental agility and focus. You have to target bad guys, learn new skills to advance and remember how to use your controller to jump over that bomb in the road or to avoid the assassin hiding in the corner. The action playing out on screen isn’t real life, but the […]

April 10, 2017

6 Symptoms of Cancer-related Depression in Patients, Caregivers and Survivors

Depression may be hard to spot. In fact, it may look a lot like the sadness, fear and anxiety you’d expect to accompany a cancer diagnosis. If you keep canceling on that friend who wants to meet for dinner, though, or you find it harder and harder to get out of bed in the morning, […]