This post is in part a response to a recent very poignant and passionate post by Chris Lewis ‘Preventing Cancer Deaths in the UK’. In it Chris, who has been living through a cancer diagnosis since 2007, shares how the UK lags behind other European countries in preventing cancer death, highlighted by this graphic, that shows deaths in 2022 on the rise across the EU. 

Chris also very knowledgeably points to & reviews a number of vitally important evidence-based approaches, which he writes are being underutilisation in this country.

This post is focused on adding one more approach, may help throw light onto why #cancer deaths continue to rise, despite the huge advances that we have witnessed in the development of ‘conventional’ cancer treatment approaches. 

It was in 1983, when I (Neil Bindemann) remember the founder of this website, my father, becoming a founding member of the British Psychosocial Oncology Society.

This felt like a significant moment in the world of oncology, and especially for Dad. He & colleagues felt it would be an organisation to bring together & grow a community with a passion for advances in ‘the field of study concerned with psychological, social and behavioural aspects of cancer’; a passion that clearly continues to this day.

There was one aspect of cancer care that was Dad’s ‘raison d’être’ and that was a person’s Quality of Life. And I stress – ‘life’ and not ‘quality of living’; because for me, and I believe him (as we never talked about that, before he died) life and living are distinctly different. One ‘happens’, which for me is experienced by just being, and the other is very much a doing. 

Listening to Dad over the years, it became clear that his ‘quality of life’ care and support went beyond seeing just a “physical body”, that was sitting with him. He placed the whole person (and often their family) in the centre of his #traumainformed care. Perhaps this quote from a reader of his book best illustrates that:

“In life generally, we need an ally (or two) and never more than when faced with life’s traumas. Dr Bindemann became my ally and all the thoughts and feelings that had threatened to overwhelm me were all there in this beautifully thought out, heartfelt but down to earth book. As if he knew himself the madness of diagnosis, and perhaps he did.”

That brings me to my main point: If there is agreement that the person is more than just the physical body, we must, while providing active ‘physical treatments’ also provide active ‘treatment/therapy/care’ directed toward ‘mind’. What does that mean? That the treatment is not simply an adjunct, designed to ‘support a person going through chemo or radiotherapy’, but an active treatment that we know delivers evidence-based results, to encourage a person to heal after receiving life-impacting medical news. 

For people to enjoy their best quality of life & ‘quantity of living’, I believe services need to recognise how the state of a person’s health is a reflection of a balance of a person’s mind, body, emotions, and energy flow. 🙏

If interested to learn more about Dr Sidney Bindemann’s book, “Living and Coping with Cancer….Help and Support through letters from a friend” please visit https://www.amazon.co.uk/Living-Coping-Cancer-Support-through/dp/1916310907/ref=sr_1_1?dchild=1&keywords=bindemann&qid=1600849208&sr=8-1