Older Adults and Sarcoma Treatment
Nurse Denise Reinke: For patients being diagnosed when they're more senior in age, they oftentimes worry, "Will I be able to handle treatment?" Many of the therapies for sarcoma are pretty aggressive chemotherapy regimens that require, oftentimes, multiple days of therapy, sometimes long days at the hospital. In our practice we see people in an outpatient area for maybe three or four days in a row, eight hours of time. And oftentimes someone who is older thinks, "Will I be able to handle this?" And I can say that we have clearly, with our supportive care agents available, been able to help people get through these therapies. [We can] manage their side effects so that they are able to tolerate the therapies and have access to the best opportunity to take care of their disease and put it into remission. And so they can be less concerned that they won't be able to tolerate it.