The strength featured within these stories.

We thank you so much, Shelly Arnold and Jill Sittenauer for sharing your caregiving experiences with us.

And in fact, Jill was telling me that she had the same exact type of cancer that her mother had ten years prior.

And oh, how interesting for her to be in with her mother as her caregiver and then having her husband care for her with the same type of cancer that she learned so much about.

But such medical advances had been made in that ten years.

But we can never be prepared for a cancer diagnosis, and most are thrust into the role of caregiver.

News like this can leave us confused, angry, unsure where to begin.

So I'm thankful to have Amy Kralicek with us now Associate Director, Access to Care Solutions Delivery for the American Cancer Society, to talk about the next steps and resources.

Amy, we are so glad we're here.

When I usually see you, you're all dressed up for a fundraiser Corks and Forks for the American Cancer Society where we learn so many things.

So let's talk with like, right when a patient gets a diagnosis, what happens?

What can the American Cancer Society do?

Absolutely.

I always say the American Cancer Society is kind of a best kept secret.

Let's face it, nobody wants to talk about cancer until you have to talk about cancer.

My recommendation is if someone's been diagnosed with cancer, if it's a loved one, if it's a if you if it's your neighbor and you want to know more, call the American Cancer Society.

That's why we're here.

We can be reached through our website at cancer org or through our one 800 National call center that's answered 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year.

That has over 200 languages available, too.

So if English isn't your native language, you can still call.

We're here to help.

What resources are available for caregivers?

There are a lot of resources available.

We often talk about cancer patients and becoming a caregiver.

Nobody signed up for it.

It just you happened to do it.

The American Cancer Society has a lot of resources available specific to caregivers.

One of them is a caregiver resource guide that talks about everything from menus, recipes that cancer patients may be interested in eating because a lot of things change with cancer treatment.

Also taking care of yourself, taking time to exercise.

We often focus so much upon the patient that the caregiver sometimes forgets to eat, and the caregiver guide kind of helps through some of those questions that you have.

And in fact, we put together a caregiver video series that talks about, I think there's some yoga that's in there that the caregivers can do.

But there's also sometimes the caregivers are asked to do medical things like changing out a tube.

Who knows how to do that?

Unless you're a medical professional, your doctor's office will show you.

But you can use a video as a backup and as a reminder of, oh yeah, this is what I'm supposed to do.

Yeah, because that could be scary.

And they don't want to do the wrong thing.

Absolutely.

Yes.

Yeah.

And our national call center also has oncology nurses on staff.

So if they want to call in and talk to an oncology nurse about, hey, I'm getting ready to change this out.

Can you talk me through this?

They're definitely there to help too.

So there are plenty of services for caregivers.

What kind of services do you offer for the cancer patients themselves?

Absolutely.

So including our national call center, we do have a health insurance assistance team.

So if someone is uninsured, underinsured, has questions about their insurance, which, who doesn't?

They can call in and they can get information for that.

We have a lot of support services available too.

I know our earlier guest talked about our recovery program, Reach to Recovery connects someone newly diagnosed with breast cancer, with a breast cancer survivor who's gone through it and is trained to talk to someone newly diagnosed with breast cancer.

And then they can pick and choose, do you want to talk to someone with the same diagnosis as you?

Maybe you want to talk to somebody who has young kids, that you're going through it and they get a pick and choose from a volunteer, from anywhere across the United States.

And we also have our Cancer Survivors network.

So if you're not diagnosed with breast cancer, but you can talk to someone else who's had colon cancer or any type of cancer through our Cancer Survivors Network.

I work in our access to care solutions.

So the best cancer treatment doesn't work if you can't get there.

Right.

And so what I do is I work in our transportation program.

We have that available in many areas across the whole United States where we have volunteer drivers that transport cancer patients back and forth to their cancer treatment related appointments.

And where that's not available, we have other transportation solutions that are available too.

So if they're traveling longer distances, where maybe a volunteer wouldn't drive three hours one way to get somebody to treatment there are other solutions available, including lodging.

You don't always think of lodging as a transportation solution, but if somebody has to travel away from home for their cancer treatment.

We have 31 Hope Lodges available across the United States, including one in Kansas City, that the cancer patient and a caregiver can stay free of charge.

And where there's not Hope Lodges we have other lodging options that are available to to assist cancer patients that have to travel away from home.

I love your caring personnel as well, because oftentimes that may be the only person that they interact with.

So they need to speak with that person as they're going to and from their treatments.

And that person can come in and listen, listen to the doctor and listen to help talk them through it.

On the way to and from.

Absolutely, yes.

And I always recommend when somebody has been diagnosed with cancer, take someone to the treatment.

Once you take someone to the doctor's appointment with you, have them take notes.

There's so much information that's thrown at you.

And don't be afraid to ask your doctor questions like, I don't understand what what you're talking about.

I don't understand what's going on or most of us are not medical doctors.

We don't understand the terminology.

And it's okay to question your doctor and say, I don't understand what's happening here.

Talk about mental health resources, because this is big a component is everything else.

Absolutely.

When someone's diagnosed with cancer, there's a lot that goes into it.

And thankfully due to research, it's being taken a lot more seriously.

The mental component of the cancer treatment, because it's not just, oh, we're going to zap this cancer, it is the whole person.

It's their whole body.

It's their whole family that's being affected by it.

So definitely more resources that are available to the cancer patients and their families and their entire families for that.

Okay.

What about the friend unit?

Let's step step out a little ways I like in fact, many of us hear about, oh, did you hear about so-and-so?

They just got to die.

And you're like, okay, what do I do?

So you want to call up and say, what can I do?

Which is like the worst thing to do because they're lost.

They're they're dealing with anything.

What can the people, not the caregivers, but the a little bit outer circle, what can they do?

And and importantly, what should they not do?

Yes, that's a great question.

First of all, I would always my best advice is to listen listen to their needs.

and also call before you visit during cancer treatment, they may not be feeling well, or they may be limited to the number of visitors that they can have.

And so definitely call listen to what their needs are.

It could be as simple as, can I take your son to softball practice?

It can be something really simple or hey, I'm heading to the grocery store.

What do you need me to pick up for you to save them a trip?

but really listen to the entire family on what their needs are, and they will tell you.

And I would even be a little, maybe proactive on it.

You don't want to bother them, but you also want them to know that you care.

And if nothing else, during Covid, we became awesome porch droppers.

And so, you know, maybe you make them a get well card and you put on their their front porch that they can just pick up whenever they can.

I would like everybody thinks, oh, I'm going to give them meals, I'm going to give them meals.

We'll ask ahead of time because with cancer treatment, sometimes tastes change.

Smells change.

it could be very helpful to have something that they could put into their freezer and pull out.

but you don't want to give them something that's going to make them feel worse.

Yeah.

And I love the card idea.

And we're going to be hearing from Insurance Commissioner Vicki Schmidt a little bit later.

And she said, of course, this is where you get to know whatever, whoever the person is, your friends.

She said she loved the kind of racy cards that she that helped her that, you know, and I just think that's a wonderful, absolutely sense of humor.

Yes, yes.

And just that listening ear, you know, they may want to talk about their cancer diagnosis.

They may not they may want to talk about what the weather is doing in California.

And it's one of the things, yeah, normal things.

And just listen to them and it's okay to say, I've never been through this before.

I don't really know what to say.

What do you want to talk about?

And it's fine because they may not want to talk at all.

They may just want you to come over and sit with them while you watch a movie.

You just really have to listen to the needs, because everybody's cancer journey is different and every person is different.

Every day is different.