Almost 18 months ago, AnCan was honored to host a fascinating, thought provoking webinar titled ‘The Language of Cancer’. To save repetition, click on this link to learn exactly what that means. Essentially we are speaking about how cancer patietns refer to themselves, and how the medical world may employ language that is unintentionally insulting.
By way of example, a doc often say a patient has failed a drug ……. NO, the patient hasn’t failed the drug – the drug has failed the patient!
Just the past week, when we were discussing this very webinar and topic in one of our virtual groups, one of our webinar panelists published a new article on the same old topic in Psychology Today, Prof Jamie Aten is the Founder of the Humanitarian Disaster Institute at Wheaton College, where he also teaches psychology. He has also lived with Stage 4 colon cancer diagnosed 7 years ago, though, thankfully, Jamie is currently NED – No Evidence of Disease.
If you live with cancer or are a caregiver, it’s almost certain you’ll have an opinion on this topic. We welcome your response if you’d like to write your own blogpost!