When Patricia started to feel weepy, she checked and discovered that this was a possible side-effect.
Transcript
You know, I’m not depressed. I don’t feel depressed but it’s interesting that when I first started feeling that there probably was something going wrong I’d be sitting and I’d all of a sudden just start to weep. Not just crying, but weeping and I thought this is just odd and feeling a bit, what you’d call, down. So I looked a little more carefully at the side effects of both tamoxifen and Evista (raloxifene) and sure enough there it was. And then I checked sites that will give you the adverse effects. Actually the Canadian Government has a very, very good website where they list adverse drug effects. So if you have had an adverse effect or you’re concerned about this, it might be one you can go and put the name of the drug in and it will tell you if they have had these reported to them by physicians all across the country. And so I looked on the sites where there were adverse drug effects listed for both tamoxifen and Evista and sure enough women described this weeping sort of thing and feeling down so that was when I knew that that’s what it was from because I’m not that sort of person. I’ve never really had a depression.
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- Alternative and complementary therapies – PatriciaFollowing exercise classes with the cancer centre helped Patricia stay in shape and at the same time it provided an informal support group.
- Endocrine (hormone) therapy – PatriciaWhen Patricia started to feel weepy, she checked and discovered that this was a possible side-effect.
- Radiation therapy – PatriciaPatricia comments on the growing awareness about long-term fatigue following radiation.
- Surgery – PatriciaPatricia learned that her breast will not look the same after a lumpectomy.
- Messages to others – PatriciaPatricia sums up several things that could be helpful.
- Managing within the health care system – PatriciaPatricia feels that patients should be sharing responsibility with their providers for their care and decision-making.
- Coping strategies – PatriciaPatricia had returned to her church prior to her diagnosis. This decision proved to be helpful in dealing with her illness.
- Perspectives on treatment pathways – PatriciaPatients do have the right to refuse treatment and Patricia thinks that it is important for the health professional to provide the patient with all the information they need to decide.
- Physical activity and diet changes – PatriciaPatricia encourages women to keep exercising and not stop doing things just because they have cancer.
- Troubling long-term effects of treatment – PatriciaPatricia described the episodes of extreme fatigue she continued to experience and explained how these episodes were different from normal tiredness.