Exercise and cancer How can exercise and staying active help us

Exercise and cancer: How can exercise and staying active help us

Being active and exercising will improve quality of life, help you feel better, more confident, reduce stress and energise you giving you more energy.

There is evidence that being active can help people with cancer. It can reduce fatigue, reduce depression, reduce anxiety and minimise the loss of bone density and strength as well as improving general wellbeing and quality of life both during and after cancer treatment.

When is it safe to exercise?

Speak to your nurse or consultant to see if it is safe to exercise. Ask them to refer you to a qualified cancer exercise specialist.

After some types of surgery, you may need to wait before you can get back to being physically active like you used to be before your treatment and surgery. If you talk to your nurse or consultant, they will be able to advise you on what exercise you can do safely.

If it is advised that you don’t exercise in a public gym due to low immunity from your treatments, it doesn’t mean that you can’t be physically active in other ways, until you can start to exercise in public gyms or other public spaces safely.

There are lots of options you can do including zoom sessions with a qualified cancer exercise specialist in a 1-2-1 session or a small group class.

These classes will generally be small as your trainer will be or should be observing the session more closely than a normal online fitness class to ensure the safety or all in attendance. This is because there will be some still going through treatments, taking medication and have other Comorbidities.

Some side effects to be aware of can be having the feeling of pins and needles or the loss of sensation in your hands and feet due to some cancer treatments. This is called peripheral neuropathy. If you have this, care would need to be taken when exercising.

It could be an easier and a safer option to use a piece of fixed equipment. This would give you the ability to take the weight away from the affected limb or limbs until the symptoms ease, if you are using or completing an exercise where you are seated and need to stand up to move on to another piece of equipment. Ensure all transitions between these are slow and controlled.

Some of you may have dizzy spells or get light headed, so again all transitions from different exercises or pieces of equipment should be done with care, and exercise prescription or the exercise order should be done to suit the individual or small group being trained. Standing, seated and floor exercises should be grouped together to limit the risk of getting light headed or dizzy.

Exercises like a burpee or a sit-to-stand from the floor should be avoided until you no longer have dizzy spells.

“Always remember that this is not a one size fits all approach to exercising during or after any cancer treatments”

Take away from this is that, as we know, exercise and being active will make us feel better, minimise the effects of the treatment and improve the treatment outcomes. But it can be hard to get started and just as important is having a good support network in place, both health care professionals and family, to get you started keep you motivated and make a difference.