Communication between you and your healthcare provider is essential. You should feel comfortable talking about all of your concerns. Feel free to ask any questions about your care. Providers should also welcome questions about their experience and qualifications.
You will have many questions during your cancer treatment. It is often helpful to prepare a list of questions before your medical appointment.
Here are some possible questions for your healthcare provider:
- What kind of lung cancer do I have?
- What stage of lung cancer do I have?
- Where has my cancer spread (if anywhere)?
- What tests do I need?
- What initial treatment do you recommend?
- How certain is my diagnosis? Is it possible that I have something other than lung cancer?
- What goals should we work toward?
- Do I have a real chance of curing my cancer? What can I hope to achieve through treatment for my condition?
- What treatment do you recommend for me? What are my other options?
- What non-medication treatments do you recommend? Why?
- What are the potential side effects of these treatments? Do I have other options?
- If I choose only palliative care, how long can I expect to live?
- Is curative surgery possible for me?
- Do I need chemotherapy or radiation therapy in addition to surgery?
- Am I healthy enough for surgery?
- What surgery do you recommend?
- What is my risk of complications from surgery?
- If surgery is not an option for me, what is my best chance of a cure?
- What type of chemotherapy will I have? How many sessions?
- What type of radiation will I have?
- What is the chance my cancer will come back?
- Will this treatment extend my life? Is it time to consider palliative care treatments only?
- What sort of exercise program do you recommend? Why?
- Should I change my diet?
- Can the different medications I am taking interact with each other?
- Do I need to avoid any activities? Should I change how I do them?
- What other monitoring do I need?
- How often should I come in for checkups?
- How often do you treat patients with lung cancer?
- How much experience do you have with each possible treatment?
- What are your personal success rates for each possible treatment?
