Rehabilitation for cancer patients

Abstract

In Japan, the number of patients with cancer is increasing drastically with the increase in number of elderly people. Therefore, recently, the necessity of rehabilitation for cancer patients has been realized. Cancer rehabilitation can be classified as preventive, restorative, supportive, or palliative and is administered according to the degree of cancer progression. Rehabilitation is of great significance even for patients with progressive cancer as it helps maintain their quality of life. Various forms of impairment, disability, and handicap are associated with cancer rehabilitation. Examples of impairments that cancer patients experience are hemiplegia and higher brain dysfunction in brain tumor cases, paraplegia and quadriplegia in spinal or spinal cord tumor cases, neuropathy and radiculopathy in cases of tumor invasion, complications after surgery, peripheral neuropathy after chemotherapy, and dysphagia after radiotherapy. It is important to evaluate these impairments and the risks associated with rehabilitation.