Our Latest Conversations Series Spotlights Survivorship
We launched a new virtual series this fall aimed at elevating voices from the childhood cancer community, and throughout October we’ve featured episodes on social media with our latest expert: Dr. Smita Bhatia, Director of the Institute for Cancer Outcomes and Survivorship at The University of Alabama at Birmingham.
This four-part Conversation between Dr. Bhatia and our Program Director Julie Taylor focuses on survivorship. Specifically, Dr. Bhatia discusses long-term follow-up care, transitioning from pediatric to adult care, and access to care for under-served populations.
LATE EFFECTS AND FOLLOW-UP CARE
First we asked Dr. Bhatia to frame the problem: What are the biggest challenges in survivorship and long-term care, and what types of late effects are of most concern for survivors?
TRANSITIONING TO ADULT CARE
Dr. Bhatia discusses the most significant challenges in transitioning to adult care after "aging out" of the pediatric oncology system - usually around age 21.
In this five minute episode, Dr. Bhatia gives advice to both non-oncology clinicians and survivors around how to ensure the best possible long-term follow-up care:
BARRIERS TO SURVIVORSHIP CARE
"If people do not engage in these screening visits, then the complications that they develop are detected in a more advanced form and the treatment is not as effective as it would be if they were detected early."
Dr. Bhatia also discusses some of the barriers that can prevent childhood cancer survivors from accessing long-term follow-up care. We discuss the challenges faced by diverse and under-served populations, how these barriers impact outcomes, and what might help improve access for these higher-risk survivors:
MODELS OF SURVIVORSHIP CARE
In this episode, Dr. Bhatia discusses the concept of risk stratification as a model of care for childhood cancer survivors.
It is relatively easy to chart a long-term care plan for high-risk survivors and for low-risk survivors. It's the majority in the middle who pose the biggest challenge. Dr. Bhatia breaks it down for us in two minutes:
We’re looking forward to having many more of these Conversations to elevate a wide variety of voices and perspectives. We share these episodes first on Facebook but you can also find a library of past episodes at childrenscancercause.org/conversations.
To learn more about childhood cancer survivorship, please explore our Stewart Initiative for Childhood Cancer Survivors, an educational resource aimed at empowering the nation’s 500,000 childhood cancer survivors to be strong self-advocates for their long-term care.