Understanding Cancer

This guide shows cancer patients how to gather and interpret information about different treatments and how to use that information to make decisions. It provides advice on preparation for visits to doctors and the hospital, defines key medical terms and explains concepts underlying the statistics and percentages used to characterize medical conditions. The author also describes the steps involved in diagnosis, staging and treatment so patients can understand what they are likely to be doing at different times and in different settings. Although the book does not provide recommendations about a specific medical problem and its treatment, it does explain how the benefits of treatment are assessed, how to interpret the results of those assessments and how to be a full partner in determining the course of medical treatment.