Episode 392: ONS 50th Anniversary: Stories From the Other Side of Cancer
The ONS Podcast
“Working as an oncology infusion nurse, being oncology certified, attending chapter meetings, going to ONS Congress® has really taught me plenty. But being an oncology patient taught me way more. I know firsthand the fears ‘you have cancer’ brings. Then going through further testing, CT scans, MRIs, genetics, the whole preparation for surgery was something I never considered when I treated a breast cancer patient,” ONS member Catherine Parsons, RN, OCN®, told Valerie Burger, MA, MS, RN, OCN®, CPN, member of the ONS 50th anniversary planning committee, during a conversation about...
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Episode 391: Pharmacology 101: Antibody–Drug Conjugates
The ONS Podcast
“Antibody–drug conjugates (ADCs) have three basic parts: the antibody part, the cytotoxic chemo, and the linker that connects the two. First, the antibody part binds to the target on the surface of the cell. Antibodies can be designed to bind to proteins with a very high level of specificity. That’s what gives it the targeted portion. Then the whole thing gets taken up by the cell and broken down, which releases the chemotherapy part. Some sources will call this the ‘payload’ or the ‘warhead.’ That’s the part that’s attached to the ‘heat-seeking’ part, and that’s...
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Episode 390: Prostate Cancer Treatment Considerations for Nurses
The ONS Podcast
“Any time the patient hears the word ‘cancer,’ they shut down a little bit, right? They may not hear everything that the oncologist or urologist, or whoever is talking to them about their treatment options, is saying. The oncology nurse is a great person to sit down with the patient and go over the information with them at a level they can understand a little bit more. To go over all the treatment options presented by the physician, and again, make sure that we understand their goals of care,” ONS member Clara Beaver, DNP, RN, AOCNS®, ACNS-BC, manager of clinical education and...
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Episode 389: Biomarker Testing for Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer
The ONS Podcast
“It’s critical to identify those mutations found that are driving the cancer’s growth and guide the personalized treatment based on those results. And important to remember, too, early testing is crucial for patients with non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC). In studies, it has been found to be associated with improved survival outcomes and reduced mortality,” ONS member Vicki Doctor, MS, BSN, BSW, RN, OCN®, precision medicine director at the City of Hope Atlanta, GA, Chicago, IL, and Phoenix, AZ, locations, told Jaime Weimer, MSN, RN, AGCNS-BS, AOCNS®, manager of oncology nursing...
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Episode 388: ONS 50th Anniversary: Milestones in Oncology Advocacy and Health Policy
The ONS Podcast
“I think we really need to push more of our oncology nurses to get into elected and appointed positions. So often we’re looking at health positions to get involved in, and those are wonderful. We need nurses as secretaries of health, but there are others. We as nurses understand higher education. We understand environment. We understand energy. So I think we look broadly at, what are positions we can get in? Let’s have more nurses run for state legislative offices, for our House of Representatives, for the U.S. Senate,” ONS member Barbara Damron, PhD, LHD, RN, FAAN, told Ryne Wilson,...
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Episode 387: Prostate Cancer Screening, Early Detection, and Disparities
The ONS Podcast
“[When] a lot of men think about prostate exams, they immediately think of the glove going on the hand of the physician, and they immediately clench. But really try to talk with them and discuss with them what some of the benefits are of understanding early detection. Even just having those conversations with their providers so that they understand what the risk and benefits are of having screening. And then educate patients on what a prostate-specific antigen (PSA) and digital rectal exam (DRE) actually are—how it happens, what it shows, and what the necessary benefits of those are,”...
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Episode 386: Interprofessional Navigation and the Oral Anticancer Medication Care Compass
The ONS Podcast
“This was a panel of subject matter experts of various nurses and pharmacists. We often found common ground but also discovered new ideas, different touchpoints, and key junctures along that oral anticancer medication journey. For example, the pharmacists were able to share their insights into their unique workflows within their practice setting. What resulted is a resource that truly reflects that collaborative effort between the disciplines,” ONS member Mary Anderson, BSN, RN, OCN®, senior manager of nursing membership and professional development at the Network for Collaborative...
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Episode 385: ONS 50th Anniversary: Evolution of Cancer Survivorship
The ONS Podcast
“It started out by doing a kind of a white paper that we called Imperatives for Quality Cancer Care. Ellen Stovall, our CEO [of the National Coalition for Cancer Survivorship] at the time, gave this report to Dr. Richard Klausner, who was the head of National Cancer Institute at the time. He called Ellen immediately and said, ‘Why are we not doing something about this?’ Within one year, we had the Office of Cancer Survivorship at NCI,” ONS member Susan Leigh, BSN, RN, told ONS member Ruth Van Gerpen, MS, RN-BC, APRN-CNS, AOCNS®, PMGT-BC, member of the ONS 50th anniversary...
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Episode 384: Learn About Scalp Cooling for Chemotherapy-Induced Alopecia
The ONS Podcast
“Chemotherapy-induced alopecia does cause a lot of stress. It’s associated with lower quality of life. Scalp cooling may really help improve quality of life. Some studies have shown that women in the scalp cooling group felt less upset about losing their hair and less dissatisfied with their appearance compared to the women in the control group that didn’t receive any scalp cooling. So a lot of these studies are showing it does have a very positive impact on psychosocial feelings and side effects in relation to overall cancer treatment,” ONS member Jaclyn Andronico, MSN, CNS, OCN®,...
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Episode 383: Pharmacology 101: Bispecific Antibodies
The ONS Podcast
“I think that this is an area that is exploding. Working with drug development, I see new agents all the time, with unique targets I’ve never heard about, with targets I have heard about used in a different way. So, I really think we’re going to see more and more bispecifics. A lot of these drugs are used second line, third line, fourth line. I would not be surprised if they moved up in treatment, especially as we learn safer ways to give these drugs,” ONS member Moe Schwartz, PharmD, BCOP, FHOP, professor of pharmacy practice at the James L. Winkle College of Pharmacy at the...
info_outline“Don’t be afraid of applying, even if you’ve never planned a conference before, and you think, ‘Well, I have no idea what I’m doing.’ You probably know more than you think you do. You probably have more connections than you think you do, and it is such a worthwhile experience,” Colleen Erb, MSN, CRNP, ACNP-BC, AOCNP®, hematology and oncology nurse practitioner at Jefferson Health Asplundh Cancer Pavilion in Willow Grove, PA, told Lenise Taylor, MN, RN, AOCNS®, BMTCN®, conferences oncology clinical specialist at ONS, during a conversation about serving on a planning committee for an ONS conference.
Music Credit: “Fireflies and Stardust” by Kevin MacLeod Episode Notes
Licensed under Creative Commons by Attribution 3.0
Episode Notes
- This episode is not eligible for NCPD contact hours.
- Oncology Nursing Podcast™ episodes:
- ONS Voice articles:
- What Brings You Value in ONS? You Can Thank a Volunteer for That
- The Power of Connection in Oncology Nursing
- Clinical Journal of Oncology Nursing article: What Is It Like to Chair the ONS Bridge™ Content Planning Team?
- ONS Volunteer Opportunities
- ONS Congress
- ONS Evidence-Based Practice Learning Library
To discuss the information in this episode with other oncology nurses, visit the ONS Communities.
To find resources for creating an Oncology Nursing Podcast Club in your chapter or nursing community, visit the ONS Podcast Library.
To provide feedback or otherwise reach ONS about the podcast, email pubONSVoice@ons.org.
Highlights From This Episode
“I saw a link on the ONS website looking for volunteer opportunities and applied, not thinking that I’d actually get chosen because I had never done anything like this before. I had spoken at conferences, but I had never been part of the planning committee. The application [had] some open-ended questions about what your expertise is and where your interests lie. … And then I got a phone call from the planning chair for that year, and we talked a little bit more in depth about the questions that were on the application, and my interests, and how I thought I would fit on the team.” TS 2:05
“The main part [of the work] was topic selection and then speaker selection once we narrowed down the topics. I feel like there was a lot of brainstorming and group effort to both of those things. You don’t have to individually have an exact topic or an exact speaker. There was a lot of ‘I think this general broad topic would be good,’ and then we narrowed it down as a group to something that would fit into a 45-minute presentation.” TS 4:30
“We talked about interventional radiology and how it seemed like it was taking on much more of a bigger role in oncology and how that could fit into the conference and whether we wanted to have a specific topic or an overview of the things that interventional radiology can offer for oncology patients. And we ended up doing kind of like a 101 topic on that one, because it was a newer topic that people were kind of interested in just hearing, like, ‘Hey, what do you guys do for cancer patients?’” TS 8:44
“I learned a lot about the backstage process of conferences. I had spoken before, but seeing the other side of it was a whole different picture—and all the work that goes into it—and I really learned a lot about picking the topics and how do we find the best information and the best sort of new themes to present to every time.” TS 12:04
“Just do it. Don’t be afraid of applying, even if you’ve never planned a conference before, and you think, ‘Well, I have no idea what I’m doing.’ You probably know more than you think you do. You probably have more connections than you think you do, and it is such a worthwhile experience. And you learn so much about yourself and about the other people on the team. And the information that you’re presenting just is huge for a lot of people. So if you’re even thinking about it, just fill out the application.” TS 14:06