What can you do?

A re-published book by an English journalist contains practical tips for friends of people who have been diagnosed with cancer, writes SYLVIA THOMPSON

IT’S HARD to know how to help when someone is told they have cancer. English journalist Deborah Hutton was diagnosed with stage four lung cancer in November 2004. Aged 49 and a mother of four children, she described herself as a “super-energetic, organising type” who, after 30 years of independence, had to let go and allow her friends share the strain.

During her short illness (she died in 2005), she wrote What Can I Do To Help?(Short Books), which contains 75 practical ideas for family and friends from what she calls the cancer frontline.

“By putting that super-competent, I-can-handle-it-myself-thank-you-very-much persona aside, I learned to accept offers gratefully and graciously – whether it was scooping up the children or cooking Wednesday night’s supper or driving me to one of the endless hospital appointments and sitting alongside me in the grim clinics . . . or snuggling up under the duvet and companionably watching a DVD on a weekday afternoon,” writes Hutton.

What Can I Do To Help?, which has been re-published due to demand, is also filled with valuable insights and honest advice from politicians, actors and TV personalities. Here are 15 tips on what you can do (and not do) for someone who has been diagnosed with cancer:

Accept the person as you find him/her, and as the people they always were. This requires no special pitying voices, no different treatment, no meaningful looks and embraces. Continue to argue about politics and football if that’s what you did.

Unless you are a close friend or immediate family, don’t rush round uninvited unless it’s to leave a gift or plate of food at the door with a note saying no reply needed.

As a health journalist, Hutton was well tuned into research, so she asked friends whose intellect and judgment she respected to keep her updated by regularly checking the internet for new clinical trials and alternative remedies. It’s a very specific task probably best left to a journalist or researcher.

Don’t offer advice unless you’re asked for it. Don’t talk in militaristic language (you’re such a good fighter) and don’t try to examine the underlying emotional reasons why the person has got cancer. Avoid false reassurances and accept that comparative tales of other people with cancer are rarely helpful. Let your friend give the lead about how much they want or don’t want to talk about their illness.

If you’re technologically minded, offer to set up a group e-mail or a blog. If you’re sending regular e-mails to someone who’s ill, don’t expect replies; the same applies to letters, phone messages, gifts left on doorsteps, etc.

Good friends can help people with cancer to manage their everyday lives. This ranges from keeping some visits short to fielding phone calls to working out a rota of who will accompany the person to hospital appointments, chemo or radiotherapy sessions.

Present yourself as a housework/ laundry/garden/chauffeur fairy. Even walking the dog can become an unmanageable chore that needs to be done. If you are money-rich and time-poor, consider clubbing together to buy in extra help.

Offer to be one of those people who can be relied on to accompany the person to appointments. Studies have shown that people recall only a quarter of what is said to them in medical consultations, so if your friend agrees, bring a notebook to write down some of the things said and questions that might need to be asked.

Offer to put your friend in contact with a support group or someone who has had a similar cancer or who has had the treatment proposed.

Suggest mini-outings to places the person enjoys. Laughter, music, poetry can momentarily remove the dark cloud that hangs over the person with cancer and his/her family.

Bring a useful present on hospital visits, such as a plate of freshly cut vegetables and dips, freshly squeezed fruit juice, an aloe vera plant (for unbroken radiation sore skin) or a talking book.

Offer to have favourite clothes dry-cleaned or taken in if your friend has lost weight during treatment.

Include children in various activities whether it’s helping cook a meal, reading a story or playing a board game, or working on a giant jigsaw near the bed.

Care for the carers by giving them a break, or taking them out on a trip, or booking them in for a massage.

Record a video while your friend is still strong enough to participate. Offer to help prepare a memory box and plan treats ahead, so that there is always something to look forward to.