Open AccessAnger and Distress of a Curable Gastric Carcinoma Patient Becoming Incurable: A Dilemma of a Pandemic
Author(s) -
Abhity Gulia,
Prateek Sharma,
Sushma Bhatnagar
Publication year - 2020
Publication title -
indian journal of palliative care/indian journal of palliative care
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.395
H-Index - 26
eISSN - 1998-3735
pISSN - 0973-1075
DOI - 10.4103/ijpc.ijpc_163_20
Subject(s) - medicine , distress , pandemic , anger , disease , dilemma , intensive care medicine , cancer , postponement , general surgery , covid-19 , psychiatry , infectious disease (medical specialty) , clinical psychology , philosophy , epistemology , marketing , business
A pandemic is a time of great distress for cancer patients with a heightened risk of infection along with fear of disease progression occurring from postponement of therapy. Our patient who was initially diagnosed early and was awaiting surgery was suddenly terrified when her surgery got postponed due to the pandemic. To add to her distress was the disease progression which left her wondering that what went wrong on her part that she was in such a situation. The dilemma of the present situation is that an already stretched system due to the pandemic cannot accommodate for elective treatments of other diseases more so when there is a risk of complications in cancer patients associated with the infection.