Low-Cost Supervised Exercise Program Helps Cancer Patients in Adelaide Rebuild Strength

On Mondays at 9:15am and Fridays at 12:30pm, a small group gathers at Adelaide University's City East Exercise Physiology Clinic for a 45-minute exercise class. There are never more than five people in the room, and every one of them is living with cancer. The classes can cost as little as $5.

This is My Cancer Exercise Program, or My CEP, a new offering from Adelaide University. The sessions are led by final-year Clinical Exercise Physiology students, supervised by an Accredited Exercise Physiologist. Each participant gets exercise tailored to them individually, even inside the group format. The program has only recently started and is now taking on eligible participants.

Rebecca Dostan, a lecturer at the university, leads the program. She says that when people are tired, weak or unwell from cancer and its treatment, exercise is understandably the last thing on their minds. Yet she argues that prescribed exercise can be a real part of cancer care: it helps manage side effects, maintain strength and function, and improve quality of life. Tailoring matters, she says, because what is safe and achievable for one person will look very different for another, depending on their cancer, treatment, symptoms and overall health.

The program draws on a body of clinical research. According to the source, studies show exercise is an effective adjunct therapy in cancer, with the relative risk of recurrence reduced by 21 to 35 percent and cancer mortality by 28 to 44 percent. Exercise has also been shown to reduce or improve treatment-related effects including chemotherapy-induced peripheral neuropathy, problems with bone health and sleep quality, cardiotoxicity, and skeletal and muscle wasting syndromes.

The student-led model serves a second purpose. Dostan says the students get to apply their skills with people whose health needs are complex and changing, while supervision ensures participants still receive individualised support. The experience, she says, is meant to prepare them for their future careers.

One participant is Jessie Marshall, a mother who was diagnosed in March this year with hormone-positive metastatic breast cancer. The cancer has spread from her breast to her bones. She is on ongoing treatment to keep the disease under control and is managing fatigue, nausea and medically induced menopause. Her McGrath Foundation Breast Cancer Nurse referred her to My CEP.

Marshall says she never expected that, after being told her cancer was incurable, she would be exercising more than ever before in her life. She says the sessions have helped her physically and mentally, that she looks forward to them each week, and that she enjoys seeing herself get stronger. With cancer in her bones, she says, building strength matters for her overall health, and she believes she is well on her way to being the strongest she has ever been. She also values working with the students, saying each has taught her something different.

The program has a set structure: an initial consultation, 10 group classes and an individual discharge plan. Participants need written clearance from their Medical Oncologist or GP before joining. With the program so new, how many people take it up, and how it serves both patients and students, remains to be seen.