Breast cancer, the ‘Notes of life’ guide to help patients

The thoughts, emotions, everyday life of women living with metastatic breast cancer become ‘Life Notes’, a 10-point guide presented on the occasion of the last National Day of Metastatic Breast Cancer, which was celebrated on 13 October, to help them understand what is really important to them: words and gestures that are helpful or, on the contrary, to be avoided, for the 37,000 women in Italy who face a diagnosis that changes their lives at fifty (30 % has 45). They are active women, with a job, a family, still young children. Scientific research in recent years allows us to give them a time of life, a perspective. The disease changes life, but at the same time gives the strength to face it. This is what is reported in an article published in Aleati per la Salute (www.alleatiperlasalute.it), a portal dedicated to medical-scientific information created by Novartis. Note di vita is not just a vademecum, “it is a gift to better face some difficult moments that we all encounter”, point out the souls of the initiative that is proposed as a practical tool, born from the campaign ‘E’ tempo di vita ‘, promoted by Novartis Italia with Salute Donna Onlus. “They are like notes that we collect from patients. The roles must be reversed, because they are the ones who have to teach us and tell us something – explains Stefania Andreoli, psychotherapist and scientific consultant of the project – The text investigates the neglected aspects in the interiority of a woman with advanced breast cancer, who has to undertake a complex path not only from a therapeutic point of view, but also from a psychological and emotional point of view, which involves many aspects of everyday life “. The women “explain to us how this narrative of the battle, of the war, of being soldiers of life, of illness and of healing, is actually a distortion, very out of focus – observes Andreoli – Let’s take a look: who should have a bad outcome of the disease was not strenuous enough in its attempts? “. It is also a “dangerous speech. We could have come to it by ourselves, but the patients themselves needed to tell us. One of these notes strikes me – he underlines – in particular: sometimes, it says, silence is more supportive. of constantly asking how you are. Those who are carriers of the disease are sometimes put in the position of having to take on the anxieties and anguish of those around them. I believe silence is unfairly underestimated, but it is profoundly communicative. There are very full and revealing silences “. But there is also hope “among the words that weigh”, notes Michelino De Laurentiis, director of the Department of breast and thoraco-pulmonary oncology at the National Cancer Institute Irccs Pascale Foundation in Naples. “I would be optimistic – he says – and it is a message that I feel I can give to women with metastatic breast cancer: in a short time we have seen a complete revolution in our ability to manage this disease. About 10-15 years ago the expectation of life was at a median of about 2 years; today it exceeds 5 years. It means that half of our women will live longer, even 7-10 years, and we do not even know if even longer than this since the new drugs they have been ‘in action’ for a few years. It means being able to block the disease, make it chronic while maintaining the quality of life “. In this way, the oncologist highlights, “we gain time and this will allow women to have access to the many new revolutionary drugs already on the horizon, which will arrive. And then, why not, maybe within 20 years – she says – we could being able to heal even metastatic breast cancer “. The complete article is available on: https://www.alleatiperlasalute.it/benessere-donna/note-di-vita-la-giornata-del-tumore-al-seno-metastatico.