Your Role as a Caregiver As cancer care increasingly incorporates a system of outpatient care, more of the burden of caring for patients is placed on family members and friends. Provide a number of non-drug interventions, such as massage, applying ointments and lotions, cold and warm compresses, positioning and helping the patient's mobility, and providing emotional support. If one does not work well, another route can be used. The message is, however, that no one with cancer should live with unrelieved pain. Taking medication by mouth, or the oral route, is generally the most convenient and inexpensive method.
Oral medications come in tablet, capsule, and liquid forms.
Most people can be treated using oral medications. Medications administered through the rectal route are prescribed when the patients have problems swallowing, as well as with nausea and vomiting. Medications administered rectally come in the form of a suppository, which dissolves from the heat of your body and releases the medication. This route is not useful if you have diarrhea, rectal pain, or if you have difficulty placing the suppository. This route is also prescribed when the patients have problems swallowing, or nausea and vomiting.