Should I exercise during cancer treatments?
As much as you can. Going through cancer treatment is no reason to give up on exercise. In fact, now is the time to keep up regularly with moderate and appropriate exercise. Obviously, it needs to be modified to what surgery you have undergone. Abdominal crunches would not be appropriate after an abdominal operation, and a weight bench would not be appropriate after a breast operation.
During treatment, walking is the best exercise. As brisk a pace as you can manage, for 15- 20 minutes daily would be great. More, if you can manage it. 15 repetitions of biceps curls with light (2-5 lbs) hand weights, and going up and down a flight of stairs 3-4 times daily will keep your conditioning. After your treatment ends, you can pick up the pace and intensity.
It used to be thought that exercise after breast cancer surgery was harmful. But that has been disproven. In fact, light to moderate exercise has been shown to be beneficial in maintaining conditioning, mobility and sense of well being.
After treatments are finished, it is important to keep up with an exercise routine, and maintain your weight in a healthy range. This is one of the major questions I address with my patients during surveillance visits. We spend a lot of time going over their day’s schedule, where they can carve out time for exercise. If they drive 5-10 minutes to work, I encourage them to walk. If walking/ bicycling to work is not an option, then the only way of keeping up is to get up 30 minutes earlier and either throw in an exercise DVD or get on a home exercise machine. If there is an option of walking at lunchtime, then get a group together to keep you on track. It is easy to find reasons not to go, without group pressure. And don’t take elevators. These may all seem self-evident suggestions, but life gets in the way. Not everyone has time to go to a gym, but we should aim for incorporating exercise into our daily lives.
For some patients, treatments will not end for a prolonged period of time. Consulting with a physical therapist, as to how much they can and should do, would be important. I have a patient who has become very deconditioned during his multiple surgeries, and he thought he couldn’t do anything for himself. We recommended Physical Therapy in the home. They started working with him twice a week, and his mobility and endurance have improved significantly. It makes him much more independent.
Of course, all this preaching can only follow if I practice it too. And I do. I only take the stairs in the hospital, and I get up 30 minutes earlier than I have to, so I can have no excuses at the end of the day. It also improves my outlook the whole day long.