This is how you do it in 5 steps
Exercise is very important if you have cancer. Your body stays fitter, and mentally you become stronger. With these tips you will get it right.
Step 1: Why Should You Move?
There is increasing scientific evidence that sport helps: before, during and after cancer treatment. Exercise keeps your muscles and heart in shape. This ensures that you are less tired and recover faster from treatments, says physiotherapist Casper Tittse.
Step 2: Have an inspection done first
Cancer changes your body. It is therefore important to have the load capacity of your body checked. This is possible with a sports medical examination by a sports doctor or an oncological physiotherapist. The inspection usually includes a bicycle test, strength measurements and a blood test.
Step 3: Find an oncology physiotherapist
Of course, you can go to a gym on your own for extra workouts. However, that is not recommended. When you are very ill, it can be difficult to estimate what your body can handle. One day is not the other. One day you get up and the next you can’t even open the curtains. More and more physiotherapists are specialized in oncological physiotherapists. They check your load capacity every day and adjust the exercises accordingly.
Oncological physiotherapists are increasingly found in hospital, but also via www.onconet.nu or www.nvfl.nl.
Step 4: Set a goal
One wants to walk the dog every day. The other wants to climb the Alpe d’Huez with the racing bike. In any case, set a personal exercise goal. Even when there is no longer any treatment for the cancer, you can set exercise goals. Exercise then helps to keep you feeling better, according to physiotherapist Tittse.
Step 5: Stay busy
Exercise is important, but recovery is just as important, says physical therapist Tittse. You also have to practice recovery, it is not automatic. The physiotherapist tries to establish a daily rhythm with people, in which they make room for effort and recovery. That way you can keep up with the schedule better.
Help through Stichting Tegenkracht
The employees of this foundation guide people in making a sports plan and its implementation. They link people with cancer to sports physiotherapists. Counterforce can also help arrange compensation to make sports possible. Sometimes an employer offers sports plans through Stichting Tegenkracht, such as for police employees. Also see: www.tegenkracht.nl
Thanks to Peter Smeets and Maartje de Groot of Stichting Tegenkracht.
