Physical interventions for patients suffering from chemotherapy-induced polyneuropathy

Extracorporeal shock wave therapy in the supportive care and rehabilitation of cancer patients

“…Secondary complications of cancer and its treatment, such as lymphedema and polyneuropathy, are of great relevance for many cancer patients. Since a specific causal therapy for those disorders does not exist, they are currently the focus of our research [1, 4, 6].…”

Response to Crevenna and Ashbury, Vallance and Bolam, and Crevenna and Keilani regarding the effects of exercise on chemotherapy-induced peripheral neuropathy

“…Taken together, there are many reasons to be excited about the use of exercise during chemotherapy in the prevention of CIPN as part of both supervised and self-management interventions [1]. Exercise has relatively little risk, it can be conducted in conjunction with other therapies, and it is also beneficial for attenuating other chemotherapy-induced toxicities such as fatigue, sleep disturbances, cognitive deficits, and distress [10].…”

“…Indeed, we are currently working on two clinical trials to this end. We are also interested in multi-site clinical trials of CIPN and we invite further collaboration, as previously suggested [1, 3]. …”

Relevance of tumor boards for cancer rehabilitation

“…In this tumor board, very challenging and complex cases are discussed to plan their rehabilitation. Their most important issues are decreased physical performance and fatigue, metastatic or lytic bone lesions, brain lesions, chemotherapyinduced peripheral neuropathy, and also cardiovascular and pulmonary disease and/or side effects of necessary (cancer) treatment, metabolic dysregulation, and lymphedema [5][6][7][8][9]. Referring to specialists from different medical specialties such as oncology, physical and rehabilitation medicine, radiology, radiation oncology, surgery, cardiology, and orthopedics (and traumatology) attend the board.…”

“…Furthermore, nutritionists, sports scientists, physiotherapists, massage therapists, and psychologists complete this interdisciplinary and multiprofessional tumor board [3,4]. All of these tumor board members are involved in the rehabilitation process, and therefore, their decision helps to define individual rehabilitation concepts for challenging cancer patients with their individual functional deficits and medical conditions [5][6][7][8][9]. After the tumor board meeting, there results a decision with (1) a contraindication for the start of rehabilitation due to different dangerous clinical issues, but in most cases, there is (2) an individual rehabilitation concept with prescriptions concerning exercise and physiotherapy, and further treatment modalities such as extracorporeal shockwave therapy, other physical modalities, and additional prescriptions for pharmacological treatment (of pain), nutrition, and psychological interventions (psycho-oncology) [1,3,4,9].…”