Oncological Rehabilitation

Cancer is now considered a chronic disease with the diagnosis and treatment methods developed in recent years. As with every chronic disease, cancer can cause psychological or physical disabilities in our patients depending on the disease and its treatment. Rehabilitation programs have been used for a long time in the treatment and adaptation process of many chronic diseases. For these reasons, oncological rehabilitation has been on the agenda in recent years.

What is Oncology Rehabilitation?

Oncological rehabilitation can be defined as a process that helps our patients gain maximum psychological, social and physical function within the limits determined by their disease and treatments. In order for oncological rehabilitation to be successful, a well-planned rehabilitation program is needed first. This oncological rehabilitation program requires a multidisciplinary approach.

Who is in the Oncology Rehabilitation Team?

Physical medicine and rehabilitation specialist - medical oncologist - radiation oncologist - surgeon - algologist - physiotherapist - psychologist - dietician
Individualized, well-planned rehabilitation programs must be created.

What are the Stages of Oncological Rehabilitation?

Preventive Phase of Rehabilitation: The aim is to eliminate problems through patient education before functional loss occurs or increases.
Restorative Phase of Rehabilitation: It aims to eliminate the problems caused by the disease and treatment or to improve the problems to the maximum extent.
Supportive Phase of Rehabilitation: It aims to identify the functional changes that occur and to minimize the problems caused by loss of function.
Palliative Phase of Rehabilitation: This period is characterized by the progression of functional loss. The aim of palliative treatment is to minimize the patient's complications and to provide physical and emotional relief to the patient and their relatives.
Scientific publications in recent years have shown that well-planned, supervised exercises reduce cancer mortality and the risk of recurrence.
In addition, a cardiopulmonary rehabilitation program is also implemented depending on the treatment used, especially to reduce cardiovascular side effects.
Both the treatment and the disease itself cause depression, anxiety and sleep disorders in patients. Programs such as body awareness training and breathing exercises are applied to cope with these problems.
Electrotherapy methods are also used in terms of pain control. These are methods such as TENS, FES, NMES, IONTOPHORESIS. These therapeutic modalities provide good pain control and also increase the daily life quality of patients.
We also treat lymphedema in cancer patients. Individualized rehabilitation programs are applied for lymphedema treatment.
Depending on the complications caused by the disease or treatment, programs such as cognitive rehabilitation, respiratory rehabilitation and neurological rehabilitation are applied.