Cancer Rehabilitation May Be Appropriate for Every Type of Cancer

Cancer prehabilitation is an understudied area of interest for Jessica Cheng, MD, where she hopes to make strides with upcoming trials.

Specifically, her research will focus on studying patients with breast and gynecologic cancers who are receiving chemotherapy but have not yet undergone surgery. She hopes that working with patients at this time point will allow them to become as fit as possible, which may improve outcomes after surgery and further treatment.

Cheng, assistant clinical professor in the Department of Supportive Care Medicine at City of Hope, noted she is currently designing a trial for these populations and hopes that this research may allow patients to have more control over their diseases.

Transcript:

Cancer rehabilitation applies to all patients with any type of cancer [or] anyone with a body. Overall, because this field is on the more recent side with not too many specialists, there’s a lot of room for research in every disease type and every stage of disease. Personally, my interest is in cancer prehabilitation. The research has exploded exponentially and become an international phenomenon over the last 10 years.

This is something very recent, and I’m working on designing a trial for patients with breast cancer and gynecologic [cancers] who are undergoing chemotherapy before surgery so that we can catch them at the earliest time point. [This may allow us to] make them as fit as possible in their mind and body at the earliest point to give them the best chance with their cancer treatment. There has been a recent study that showed that in patients who are undergoing neoadjuvant chemotherapy for breast cancer, the [patients] who did an exercise and nutrition training program were able to achieve a good outcome with pathologic complete response in 53% of the cases vs 28% of people who did not do the program. [I had] a lot of times talking with patients about [how] chemotherapy is not an excuse to not do exercise. It should be your push to exercise with all that you have in you to help the chemotherapy potentially work better. It’s a way that they can have a measure of control over their cancer journey.

Reference

Sanft T, Harrigan M, McGowan C, et al. Randomized trial of exercise and nutrition on chemotherapy completion and pathologic complete response in women with breast cancer: the lifestyle, exercise, and nutrition early after diagnosis study. J Clin Oncol. 2023;41(34):5285-5295. doi:10.1200/JCO.23.00871