We are aiming to make new medical devices to make radiotherapy more comfortable.
What’s the project?
We are investigating how we might treat radiotherapy patients upright on a special chair, rather than lying down. As part of this, we would like to gain views from former patients who received surgery followed by radiotherapy, for breast cancer.
Why do you want me to be involved?
We are still at an early stage of our research: we would like patients’ voices to inform our decisions from the outset. We’d like to hear your thoughts on the standard body position for breast radiotherapy (where patients lie down with their arms up above their head), versus possible alternatives. Your views would guide us as we make plans to develop new medical devices to support alternative arm and body positions, potentially making radiotherapy more comfortable for future patients.
What will you ask me to do?
We would like to conduct a 1 hour online session, to gain views on possible arm and body positions for breast radiotherapy. This would be an open discussion, facilitated by Kay Stephenson of the Surrey Hub of the NIHR Research Design Service, South East. We would record the online session in order to generate a transcript, for future reference. This transcript would be anonymised – names and personal details would not be included. The session recording would then be deleted at the earliest opportunity.
Who can take part?
We are looking for participants who underwent surgery followed by radiotherapy for breast cancer, between 12 and 36 months ago. You would be compensated for your time.
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