{"id":845318,"date":"2026-08-04T03:40:10","date_gmt":"2026-08-04T03:40:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/845318\/"},"modified":"2026-08-04T03:40:10","modified_gmt":"2026-08-04T03:40:10","slug":"chronic-cancer-is-not-a-death-sentence-study-and-art-shows","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/845318\/","title":{"rendered":"Chronic cancer is not a death sentence, study and art shows"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Living with chronic cancer is a reality for many Canadians. Sam Schembri<\/a>, a research assistant at the University of Alberta, hoped to depict the everyday lives of those with chronic cancer through the LONGEVITI art exhibit<\/a> at the Stanley Milner Library.<\/p>\n

Schembri was the only participant in the research study<\/a> not from a nursing background. Her role was to guide eight participants with chronic cancer in making art for the exhibit. It was led by Edith Pituskin<\/a> and Holly Symonds-Brown<\/a>, who are professors in the faculty of nursing.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cMy role was to \u2026 get other angles that maybe the interviews and nursing department couldn\u2019t quite get into,\u201d said Schembri. She built relationships with participants to discover what it means to live with chronic cancer and the various highs and lows associated with it.<\/p>\n

Themes of hope, nature, and spirituality <\/p>\n

\u201cI was quite pleasantly surprised,\u201d Schembri reflected. \u201cA lot of people had a lot more positive changes than I would have assumed.\u201d She explained that many participants possessed a deep connection to nature that allowed them to find peace in their diagnoses.<\/p>\n

Some feel like their body is failing them, but are still able to find connections with their environments, according to Schembri. Participants used metaphors in the artwork to express the continuity of their lives. <\/p>\n

\"\"Julia Derus<\/a> LONGEVITI exhibit <\/p>\n

By reprioritizing what\u2019s important in life, patients focused more on community connections and building healthy habits. They asked themselves what actually makes them happy, and how they want to spend their remaining time.<\/p>\n

The health-care system often reduces patients to statistics or diagnoses and leaves patients feeling dehumanized. \u201cI didn\u2019t know a lot about these people\u2019s direct diagnoses. I\u2019m just meeting them as people,\u201d said Schembri. Participants took the lead in making their artwork, a break from the constant instructions in health-care settings.<\/p>\n

The opportunity to voice their experiences was especially important. According to Schembri, patients can feel misunderstood and isolated. Health-care workers often don\u2019t have time to talk with patients about their feelings because of other responsibilities. Her creative approach made sure to treat participants like human beings whose experiences and opinions are valuable and important.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"\"Julia Derus<\/a> LONGEVITI exhibit Educating the public and health-care providers <\/p>\n

Leaving a legacy through artwork was a great benefit of the exhibit. The study allowed participants to discuss aspects of life with chronic cancer that the public might be unaware of. Those with chronic cancer live fulfilling lives by using oral agents to manage symptoms. <\/p>\n

Breaking preconceived notions was another goal. \u201cWe shouldn\u2019t be looking at people with terminal cancer as a ticking time bomb for when they\u2019re going to pass,\u201d Schembri said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

She reflected that the idea of survivorship often only applies to those who beat acute cancer. Those who live with chronic cancer are usually left out. We need to reframe societal perceptions of cancer patients to include those with chronic cancer, Schembri emphasized. A greater understanding of the nuances of life with cancer is also needed.<\/p>\n

Schembri hopes the exhibit will change perceptions of how terminal illnesses are generally thought of. She expressed that society shouldn\u2019t be \u201cafraid of people with terminal illnesses,\u201d and a greater comfort level discussing illnesses is needed.<\/p>\n

\u201cSome of the strongest people are the ones that may not be able to ever beat cancer,\u201d said Schembri.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Living with chronic cancer is a reality for many Canadians. Sam Schembri, a research assistant at the University…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":845319,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[49,48,7714,58813,294287,294288,39980,84,392,72027,294289,294290,4779,294291,294292,294293,203251,203252,81244],"class_list":["post-845318","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-health","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-cancer","tag-cancer-patients","tag-chronic-cancer","tag-edith-pituskin","tag-faculty-of-nursing","tag-health","tag-healthcare","tag-holly-symonds-brown","tag-julia-derus","tag-longeviti","tag-nature","tag-sam-schembri","tag-stanley-milner-library","tag-terminal-disease","tag-u-of-a","tag-ualberta","tag-university-of-alberta"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/845318","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=845318"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/845318\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/845319"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=845318"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=845318"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=845318"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}