Introduction

Does Cancer Have to be Painful?

Many people believe cancer is a very painful disease. If your child has cancer, you may be concerned that he or she will suffer a great deal of pain. Until recently, this often happened. Fortunately, what we now know about pain, and how to control it, means that children's cancer does not have to be painful. In fact, an important goal of treating childhood cancer is to eliminate as much pain as possible. With the help of doctors, nurses, and other people caring for your child, almost all pain can be reduced or eliminated.

Purpose of this Handbook

This handbook was written for parents of children with cancer. Our main goal is to teach parents about pain and how they can help their child deal with pain from cancer.

It is difficult for parents when their child is first diagnosed with cancer. They are often in a state of shock, feel numb, and do not know how to help their child. This book gives suggestions for ways you can help and an overview of pain management ideas. The first part of the book talks about things that may cause pain in childhood cancer. The next sections discuss what is known about how to prevent and reduce children's pain. The last part of the book describes the best ways to treat pain from specific procedures a child may have.

We suggest you read this book from start to finish, as soon as you are able. There is a lot of information in it, but much of what you read in the first part of the book will become clearer after you have read all the sections. Keep the book handy. Re-read it as different situations come up for your child. We think you will learn something new each time you read it.

Sometimes this book uses medical terms you may not know. Some of these are defined when you first read them. For words not defined in the book, we've made a glossary of medical terms at the end. If there are other words or ideas you don't understand, your child's nurse or doctor can help.

Parents can play a role in the management of their child's illness. One of the reasons we wrote this book is to help parents feel more comfortable about being involved in the treatment of their child's pain. We hope you will talk to the doctors and nurses about the things in this book. The more we all know about pain control, the more we will be able to help the child who has pain from cancer