Cancer support program for young people launches nationwide

The purpose of the program is to provide information and professional advice regarding the unique needs of young people with cancer.

Rambam's oncology department established a program for young people with cancer in collaboration with Halasartan (photo credit: Courtesy)
Rambam's oncology department established a program for young people with cancer in collaboration with Halasartan
(photo credit: Courtesy)

For the first time, a national program was launched to treat and support young people with cancer in Israel.

The program for young people with cancer being treated at Rambam's oncology department was established about a year ago in collaboration with Halasartan to help address the unique challenges during the period of illness and treatment and to provide a customized supportive system in various areas, and to provide a response within the hospital while maintaining a treatment sequence tailored to young people.
The purpose of the program is to provide information and professional advice regarding the unique needs of young people with cancer.
In a meeting held at the oncology department at Rambam with the participation of representatives of the largest oncology institutes in Israel (Prof. Irit Ben-Aharon-Rambam, initiator and director of the program, Dr. Naama Halpern-Sheba, Dr. Sharon Peles-Ichilov, Dr. Hadar Goldwasser - Beilinson) and Shira Kuperman, Co-founder an CEO of Halasartan Association. The results of the program's activities for young people were presented in order to implement the program at the national level in all major hospitals.
The program at Rambam includes a coordinator-nurse for the young people who touches on a wide range of areas, including social aspects, emotional state, cognitive function, functional rehabilitation, relationships, sexuality and body image, fertility and menopause / andropause.
The program demonstrates extremely high satisfaction rates among patients, and continues to expand continuously. As part of this, a young patients' council is held periodically, which contributes to the design of the program's activities in consultation with the patients themselves.
In addition, as a result of a survey conducted by members of the Halasartan community, the need arose to create a meeting between new patients and their friends who have recovered. Thus, for the first time, a recovery representative from the Halasartan community joined the program, whose role is to make available to the new patients the variety of digital tools that community members provide for the benefit of the patients' unique needs.