STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. \u2014 Staten Island University Hospital celebrated the opening of its new Supportive Oncology Program at the Florina Cancer Center with a ribbon cutting ceremony on Thursday.<\/p>\n
Meagan Sills, president of the hospital, said the launch marks a significant expansion of services aimed at supporting patients holistically.<\/p>\n
\u201cSupportive Oncology is focused on improving the quality of life for patients living with cancer, from the time of diagnosis through treatment and beyond,\u201d Sills said in a speech before the ribbon cutting.<\/p>\n
Sills said the program will not only help patients manage physical symptoms, but will address the \u201cemotional, social and spiritual needs that can arise during treatment.\u201d<\/p>\n
Dr. Timothy Wigand said the program\u2019s focus is on the quality of life for patients.<\/p>\n
\u201cOur goal is to make sure that people have the support they need to live as long as possible and as good as possible,\u201d Wigand said in his speech.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019ve seen that patients who work with a palliative care doctor earlier on in diagnosis actually live longer,\u201d Wigand said in an interview after the ceremony.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think my job is to take a step back,\u201d Wigand said. \u201cAnd just make sure that whatever treatments people are going through, they are tolerating them in the right way and having the right support with medication.\u201d<\/p>\n
Dr. Thomas Bradley said the new program is a \u201ctestament to our commitment to treating the whole person, and not just the disease.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWe know that a cancer diagnosis impacts every facet of a patient\u2019s life,\u201d he said in a speech during the ceremony. \u201cPatients often grapple with debilitating side effects, anxiety, depression, nutritional challenges, financial burdens and the task of navigating life post-treatment.\u201d<\/p>\n
Bradley said the staff at Florina is committed to fulfilling the unmet needs of patients. <\/p>\n
\u201cOur vision was to provide a safety net, a guiding hand and a source of strength for every patient and their loved ones throughout their cancer journey,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Wigand said by next year he hopes to see a higher percentage of patients integrated in the program.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s important for people to realize that if they are facing cancer, that a palliative care doctor and supportive oncologist are here to make sure that your life can be the best it can, and also help you live longer.\u201d<\/p>\n
Wigand said with the rollout of this program he hopes to see patients live longer lives.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think we\u2019ll have a lot more patients that will be able to tolerate treatments for longer and do better,\u201d Wigand said. \u201cThere\u2019s been an absence of that on the Island. We didn\u2019t have the same type of specialty support, but we have it now.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. \u2014 Staten Island University Hospital celebrated the opening of its new Supportive Oncology Program at…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":132868,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[39],"tags":[9,24,63,134,136,135],"class_list":{"0":"post-132867","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-staten-island","8":"tag-new-york","9":"tag-new-york-city","10":"tag-nyc","11":"tag-staten-island","12":"tag-staten-island-headlines","13":"tag-staten-island-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/132867","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=132867"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/132867\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/132868"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=132867"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=132867"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=132867"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}