Clear and useful communication has been called “the heart of the art of medicine.” More than just being a pleasing rhyme, this expression conveys a vital truth. Effective communication provides the key that ignites the engine of successful relationships between someone who has cancer and that person’s care providers—the physicians, the nurses, the support staff from many disciplines—who are traveling together on the treatment journey. Without good communication, the relationship engine sputters and stalls. Confusion ensues. Frustration boils over like an overheated radiator. Even worse, effective cancer care suffers. Without good communication, the community lacks access to important, even life-altering, information.
With this blog, it is my hope to enhance our community outreach and communication efforts. Here you will find brief, informative, practical, and sometimes entertaining articles written by various members of the CHMC staff and you will have another opportunity to talk back to us and have your questions and concerns addressed. As chairman of our Cancer Committee and a recent cancer survivor, I will offer a weekly column ranging over a wide array of subjects, depending on how my muse inspires me at any given time. I plan to offer short interviews with various staff members that will help you to get to know them better, trending stories on developments in cancer care, insights into the daily experience of cancer care delivery, guidance and helps for care access, reflections on current controversies, links to resource pages, and many other features—you’ll have to keep following me to find out what kind of pleasant surprises we have in store!
At its best, communication flows both ways. Therefore, this blog will also provide a venue through which you may speak back to us, to let us know what is pressing upon your minds and hearts regarding cancer health care. Below we provide directions for how to submit comments and questions. Respect for privacy and legal constraints means we will not be able to address individual and person-specific matters in a public forum like this blog—for that you will want to speak directly to your physicians, nurse practitioners, nurse navigators and other relevant care providers. And we can help you arrange for that, too.
We hope you are as excited about the prospects for this new CalvertHealth venture as we are!
Dr. Abbott is a medical oncologist and Chair of the CalvertHealth Cancer Committee
Cancer Care