Survivors of gynecologic cancers may face unique challenges when navigating the emotional and social effects that cancer has on their lives after treatment. Gynecologic cancers are cancers that start in the female reproductive organs and include cervical cancer, ovarian cancer, uterine cancer, vaginal cancer, and vulvar cancer. One tool that can be helpful for gynecologic cancer survivors in managing their follow-up care is a survivorship care plan.
In this podcast, Fay Hlubocky, PhD, MA, and Merry Jennifer Markham, MD, FACP, FASCO, discuss what survivors of gynecologic cancers should know about the transition following the completion of cancer treatment, how survivorship care plans can help with this transition, and how to cope with the challenges they may face during survivorship.
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What can survivors of gynecologic cancers expect during the transition from active treatment to post-treatment survivorship? [2:10]
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What is a survivorship care plan? [4:38]
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Why are survivorship care plans especially important for people treated for gynecologic cancer? [5:46]
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What are some of the psychosocial challenges survivors of gynecologic cancers may face? [7:12]
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What are ways to cope with these psychosocial challenges? [9:25]
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Where can people find gynecologic cancer-specific survivorship care plans? [14:16]
Dr. Hlubocky is a licensed clinical health psychologist with an expertise in psychosocial oncology and a health care ethicist at the University of Chicago Medicine in the Department of Medicine, Section of Hematology/Oncology, the Supportive Oncology Program, and the Maclean Center for Clinical Medical Ethics in Chicago, Illinois. She is also the 2022 Cancer.Net Associate Editor for Psychosocial Oncology. Dr. Markham is Chief of the Division of Hematology and Oncology and a clinical professor in the Department of Medicine at the University of Florida in Gainesville, Florida. She is the Associate Director for Medical Affairs for the UF Health Cancer Center (UFHCC), serving as Chief Medical Officer for cancer services at UF Health. She is also the 2022 Cancer.Net Associate Editor for Gynecologic Cancers.
Disclosure information for Dr. Hlubocky and Dr. Markham can be found in their individual biographies linked to above.
The American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) has survivorship care plan forms available specifically for people with cervical cancer, ovarian cancer, and uterine cancer. ASCO also has a general survivorship care plan form available for people with any type of cancer.
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