Cancer young 'need more home care'
Updated on 02 December 2008
Young cancer patients are spending more time in hospital than they need to because of a lack of children's community nurses and social workers, a charity said.
Nearly half of the families surveyed by CLIC Sargent felt they did not get enough support at home to care for a child with cancer.
Parents said they felt isolated, frightened and unable to cope when their child returned home from hospital.
The charity said this resulted in longer hospital stays or the child having to return unnecessarily for minor treatment.
It wants to see improvements to community care and support so that all children and young people with cancer can be treated at home, or as close to home as possible.
The survey, published to mark the start of Childhood Cancer Awareness Month, found the majority of children with cancer (97%) wanted to be able to go home during treatment so they could spend time with friends and family and go back to school.
Nineteen-year-old cancer survivor, Manvir Randhawa, said: "Being sick is the easy bit. It is the other things - school, confidence, getting back to having friends, your emotions - that are really difficult. And yet children and young people are being left to cope with all of this on their own."
Dr Carole Easton, chief executive of CLIC Sargent, said: "Each day spent in hospital is an extra day a child is losing out on his or her childhood.
"Being cared for safely at home so that they can be with family and friends or go back to school not only helps children and young people with cancer lead as normal a life as possible, but also helps them cope better with the challenges of cancer treatment."
The charity said provision of community care services for children was patchy, with levels of care and support varying according to where patients lived.
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