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Symposium

Cancer Rehabilitation

Cancer Rehabilitation for Pain Management: An Interdisciplinary Perspective at an Inpatient Rehabilitation Hospital and Ambulatory Rehabilitation Cancer Clinic to Improve Health-related Quality of Life 1165

Thursday, October 30, 2025
12:00 PM - 1:00 PM  
Location:  ROOM: Private Dining Room #2 >>> DIRECTIONS: Third Floor >>> From the Main Elevator Bank, proceed left past Williford and Astoria. PDR #2 is located to the left in the small corridor.
Cancer-related pain may not be life threatening, but it is a common symptom that can cause debility and psychological distress which could impact quality of life in a patient with cancer. A multi-disciplinary cancer rehabilitation team which includes physical therapists, occupational therapists, speech language pathologists, and physiatry plays a pivotal role in management of cancer pain to allow for improved function and overall health-related quality of life. As stated by Mestdagh et al the “goal should be to improve quality of life, not to increase the lifespan at the expense of its quality”. The overall goal of this symposium is to address the effectiveness, importance and management of improving cancer pain through an integrative approach in both acute and ambulatory rehabilitation settings.  

Learning Objectives:

  • Provide rehab guidelines and clinical pathways for cancer disease.
  • Explain the role of the physiatrist in management of cancer pain including medical management, use of injections such as cortisone and Botox and referral to ancillary services including PT, OT, and SLP.
  • Describe therapy interventions including neuromuscular re-education, activity modification, manual therapies, modalities to address bone pain, soft tissue pain, and neuropathic pain.
  • Discuss program outcomes related to HRQoL and measures employed to improve HRQoL across the interdisciplinary inpatient rehabilitation team as related to cases involving bony metastasis.
  • Review the integration of evidence-based rehabilitation interventions in the ambulatory setting, specifically how we establish treatment plans and goals that address cancer pain while aligning with individual patients’ cancer journeys. In addition, we will discuss how we utilize our relationship with physiatry to enhance effectiveness of therapy interventions. Finally, we will examine how we monitor effectiveness of interventions to determine the need for program development and staff education.