I f cancer is a mountain to be scaled, then fear is the tenuous overhang of snow on the face, ever-threatening to bury the climber in an avalanche of emotion. Oncology nurses watch their patients face this climb every day, and guide them along the path they know well. Some scalers reach the summit. Others succumb to fear, are carried away and lost. You're going to be alive for a long time.
Oncology nurses are the face and voice of cancer treatment for most patients.
But those who have been in other disciplines say that working in the cancer unit, and seeing patients and their friends and families return for weeks and months on end, is different than working in other parts of the hospital. The emotional investment made by both sides in the climb up Mount Cancer expands the role of the oncology nurse far beyond what's taught in college. Clinical skills and counseling instinct comprise the rest of their duties, which begin when the nurse faces a newly diagnosed patient for the first time. It is not the easiest opening line, but they count on compassion and honesty to get through it. Sometimes they do, sometimes they need a little time.