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NCHPAD - Building Healthy Inclusive Communities

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Introduction


The treatment and early detection of cancer has improved tremendously over the years resulting in approximately 13.7 million survivors reported in 2012 in the United States.  This growing population is expected to increase to nearly 18 million by the year 2022 according to a report from the American Cancer Society and the National Cancer Institute.¹  There are many unique challenges that cancer survivors face including “recurrent cancer, chronic disease, and persistent adverse effects on physical functioning and quality of life (QOL).”²  In the past, clinicians advised rest and avoidance of activity in cancer patients however, this advice is changing.  A roundtable organized by the American College of Sports Medicine (ACSM) in 2009 concluded that “exercise training is safe during and after cancer treatments and results in improvements in physical functioning, quality of life, and cancer-related fatigue in several cancer survivor groups.”²  In alignment with the 2008 US Department of HHS Physical Activity Guidelines for Americans (PAG), cancer survivors should be as physically active as their abilities allow and avoid inactivity.  For this article, the definition of “cancer survivor” reported in CA: A Cancer Journal for Clinicians is used, “describing any person who has been diagnosed with cancer, from the time of diagnosis through the balance of life.”¹


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