Local 12: UC cancer treatment goes beyond treating the disease

Local life coach Krista Powers, her partner Patrick and the University of Cincinnati's Sara Kleinschmidt, MD, recently joined Local 12's What's Happening in Health to discuss the importance of supporting patients' mental and emotional health in addition to treating their disease.

"I started thinking of it like ingredients when you bake a cake," Powers said. "It's like you have mental health, emotional and spiritual, financial and sexual, all of these ingredients. They're all good on their own, but when you put them together, you make an amazing cake, and I can't pull the mental health out on its own."

Kleinschmidt is a primary care doctor at the University of Cincinnati Cancer Center's Oncology Care Clinic, the only primary care clinic in the region designed to serve cancer patients and survivors.

"It’s born out of a recognition that people with cancer have other diseases they are dealing with simultaneously, and sometimes more so," said Kleinschmidt, UC adjunct assistant professor and a UC Health physician. "So we know that with cancer and surviving cancer, there’s a great incidence of mental health issues, hypertension, diabetes. You’re at more risk of these things as a survivor or dealing with cancer, and so primary care is then kind of folded into that mix.

"I would encourage anyone who is navigating cancer and mental health issues, or any mental health issues, it’s always right to also start with your primary care doctor," Kleinschmidt continued. "That is what we are here for. Anyone in your health care team is a listening ear, but your primary care doctor is a place to start. And at the University of Cincinnati Cancer Center, we are well connected with psychology, psychiatry, accupuncture, so while I might be your first point of connection, I have many places to reach out from there."

Watch the What's Happening in Health segment. (Note: Segment featuring Powers and Kleinschmidt begins around 5:20 mark.)

Featured photo at top of Breast Cancer Awareness Month ribbon. Photo/Lludmila Chernetska/iStock.