Vim & Vigor - Summer 2017 - North Mississippi - 6

CARE TAILORED
FOR YOU
In addition to individualized medical services, NMMC Cancer
Care offers support services for patients.

COUNSELING SERVICES

NMMC Cancer Care now offers counseling services.
Counseling helps people respond to their mixed emotions
about life's challenges in healthy ways. Counselors cannot
always solve problems, but they provide a safe place for
people with cancer to talk about their concerns. Counseling
can help patients learn ways to cope, manage depression
or anxiety related to diagnosis or change in prognosis, learn
to communicate with the healthcare team and talk about
any other concerns.

CANCER PATIENT NAVIGATORS

Patient navigators act as advocates for newly diagnosed
cancer patients. The navigators assist patients in accessing
referrals and resources that meet their individual needs,
and follow patients through the continuum of care and
treatment to help ensure their needs are being met. The
navigator works with all members of the cancer team to
coordinate care. Patient navigators are currently provided
for breast, lung and colorectal cancer patients.

TUMOR CONFERENCES

Fighting cancer takes a team of healthcare providers-
surgeons, pathologists, radiologists, medical and radiation
oncologists, nurses, technicians and more. NMMC holds
weekly cancer conferences, including dedicated breast, lung
and colorectal cancer conferences, where a multidisciplinary
group of physicians and other healthcare professionals
reviews each new cancer diagnosis. The team communicates
about every patient so every treatment plan is individualized
and takes into account all the clinical viewpoints.

ACCREDITATIONS/RECOGNITION

Breast Imaging Center of Excellence
The NMMC Breast Care Center has been designated a Breast Imaging Center of Excellence by
the American College of Radiology for earning
accreditation in mammography, stereotactic
breast biopsy, breast MRI and breast ultrasound
(including ultrasound-guided breast biopsy).
NMMC Cancer Registry Gold Certification
The NMMC Cancer Registry was awarded the Gold
Certification by the Mississippi Cancer Registry, which
recognizes hospitals for the submission of timely, complete
and high-quality data to the Mississippi Cancer Registry.

SUMM ER 2 0 1 7

Y-90 FOR LIVER CANCER

For patients who have liver cancer, or cancer that
has metastasized into the liver from elsewhere in
the body, radioembolization is a new outpatient
treatment option available at NMMC.
Radioembolization, or Y-90, is a minimally
invasive treatment that uses tiny radioactive
beads, called microspheres, to deliver radiation directly to cancerous tumors in the liver.
The beads, which measure about one-third the
diameter of a human hair, are placed directly
inside the tumor. Over 10 to 12 days, the beads
emit high-dose radiation, causing the tumor
to shrink.
"Y-90 is used to treat liver cancer that cannot be removed with surgery," says Jeff Howard,
MD, an interventional radiologist. "It has the
potential to shrink tumors or downstage them so
a patient would be eligible for other treatments.
Radioembolization has been shown to help liver
cancer patients live longer with an improved
quality of life."
Y-90 radiates the tumor from the inside out
with a different type of radiation particle that
does not travel very far into the nearby tissues,
thus helping limit the injury to the normal liver.
The source of the radiation, Yttrium-90 (Y-90),
is embedded into tiny glass beads, which are
then delivered to the tumors through a catheter
placed in the hepatic artery, the predominant
source of blood flow to the tumors. The normal, healthy part of the liver receives its blood
mostly from the portal vein and is therefore
spared from the radiation.
Side effects are generally minimal, and patients
return home within hours of the procedure.

WEBSITE

Connect with Us
Visit www.nmhs.net/cancer_annual_
reports.php to view the 2016 Cancer
Program Annual Report or www.nmhs.
net/cancer_services.php to learn more
about NMMC Cancer Care's services.

http://www.nmhs.net/cancer_annual_reports.php http://www.nmhs.net/cancer_annual_reports.php http://www.nmhs.net/cancer_services.php http://www.nmhs.net/cancer_services.php

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Vim & Vigor - Summer 2017 - North Mississippi