- Hi, my name is Keyosha Gaines with Nashville General Hospital.

On today's "For your good health," we're going to talk about side effects of cancer treatment.

Most everyone will have some side effects from cancer treatments, and those side effects can look like different things.

It can be fatigue, it can be infection, it can be nausea or vomiting.

We also have some patients that may have some mouth sores or altered taste.

Other things we can have are pain, so there will be some side effects from cancer treatments.

However, your oncology team is here to manage those side effects with you.

One of the biggest things we tell you is definitely make sure you're washing your hands, avoiding people that are sick, avoiding crowds.

That's very important.

When you have cancer treatment, you're more prone to infection.

Definitely, our goal with the chemotherapy is to lessen their pain.

However, some of the treatments can cause pain, such as neuropathy, and neuropathy can look like numbness and tingling or burning sensation in the hands and feet.

And we do have medications to help combat those side effects.

Managing pain can also look like warm baths.

It can also look like cold compresses, definitely relaxation or listening to some therapeutic music.

There are different techniques that are not pharmacological, that we can try before we just try medications.

So fatigue, I would say is the major thing most of our patients complain of, and it is a part of the treatment.

It is from the cancer cells being attacked and getting some of those good cells as well.

But the best thing you can do for fatigue, and I know it sounds crazy, but it's to be active, it's to maintain your routine.

It's also, we'll look at your nutrition, making sure you're having good, well-balanced diet are the major things that we can do to help with the fatigue.

So it is very important that we maintain your weight, okay?

Because when you start these treatments, everything we do is weight based.

So when you're losing weight, again, sometimes we have to dose reduce your medications because of the weight you've lost.

You wanna make sure you're staying hydrated.

That is a key of chemotherapy treatment, making sure you're drinking and having a well-balanced diet.

As your oncology care team, that is what we're here for.

We're here to help you through your journey.

My name is Keyosha Gaines.

Thank you for watching "For your good health."