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The Evidence into Practice Committee offers their quarterly newsletter discussing the impact navigators can have on strengthening the physical and psychosocial adjustment to a cancer diagnosis by identifying and promoting effective coping strategies.

The authors discuss how nurse navigators, patient navigators, and social workers can collaborate to fill vital roles in direct patient psychosocial care and develop processes and procedures that improve delivery of that care.

The authors present a case study demonstrating effective psychosocial care and the impact navigators can have in improving patient quality of life.

Racial inequality in healthcare is a long-standing problem that has been studied for decades.

Sexual dysfunction is a common problem for cancer survivors, and nurses can be a part of the solution by addressing this issue, educating themselves, and joining with other health professionals who care about patients’ sexual health.

Recent approvals of several checkpoint inhibitors across multiple cancer settings have brought more than just new and improved treatments to the clinic.

Although symptom management is a cornerstone of high-quality cancer care, according to data presented at the 2016 Palliative Care in Oncology Symposium, clinicians often miss the incidence of patients’ symptoms or underestimate their magnitude.

In recent years, the cancer patient’s experience has been recognized as an important factor in determining the value of a treatment. According to patient reports, their quality of life (QOL) remained stable on the immunotherapy nivolumab, whereas it significantly deteriorated on chemotherapy, as shown in an analysis of a phase 3 study of platinum-refractory, recurrent, metastatic head and neck cancer.

For many patients with advanced melanoma and lung cancer, checkpoint inhibitors have been a godsend, helping to extend survival to previously unthinkable lengths.

At the 2016 Palliative Care in Oncology Symposium, the message was clear and emphatic: We should care about caregivers as both co-deliverers and co-recipients of healthcare services.