Action Research: Benevolence and Barriers of Reciprocal Career Plan for Cancer Community

Background: There are 106 cancer communities organized by cancer patients and their family members as volunteers. Mutual help between patients and family members, according to practical experiences and researches, is more important and irreplaceable than professional help. Hence all service projects set off by Hope Foundation for Cancer Care aims at helping to bridge mutual help and coping skills among patients. In recent years, cancer patients are getting younger and younger, and their financial status for medical and daily expenses become heavy weight. In addition, cancer is proven to be a chronic disease. It is inevitable for cancer patients to return to workforce. Therefore, supporting cancer patients for employment is one of the major ways we can help patients to maintain their quality of life. Namely, being used acts bifacade to family financial sources and self-identifications. Aim: In response to their need for financial support and identity empowerment, Hope Foundation for Cancer Care offers reciprocal career plan for cancer community through action researches to support cancer patients build up active plans for participation in working fields. Hope Foundation also encourages patients to take part in the decision making process, so that the foundation can offer its service in accordance to patients' needs. Methods: Action research was carried out for one year. 3 patient-workers and 3 full-time workers were included in this plan. Results: Staff members' workload reduced since the patients joined the team. Together they went through nine meetings to improve the space and the procedure of the service they are offering. These meetings and discussions not only facilitated management of the organization, but also allow the patients to express their ideas and creativity as well as enhance their own authority at work. However, due to bureaucracy of the organization, ideas proposed by the patients often took a long period of time to receive response, which potentially caused them to hold back. Therefore, they were at best partly empowered at work. On the other hand, they who'd gone through cancer themselves, helped the staff to optimize the service to others by bridging their own experiences and participating in discussions with staffs of the organization. Such reciprocal relationship between the patients and the organization embodies the very aim of this project. Conclusion: Two among the three patient-workers were officially recruited as employees in 2018. From patients to paid staffs, they transformed from receiving help to giving help. After the project ran for a year, all the staffs agreed that these patient-workers made a big contribution to the foundation. Not only did they help build the working space more friendly because of their physical conditions, but challenge the foundation to adapt more flexible management tactics, which reflects our core value - to serve for the rights of the patients.