Search - The Truth About Cancer on DVD

An Excellent PBS Documentary on Living with Cancer

V. R. Hutter | Durham, NC | 07/07/2009

(5 out of 5 stars)

"This is a very intimate portrait of people living with, fighting and eventually dying of cancer. There is such fear associated with the word cancer and a stigma associated with the many diseases of mutations in our cells we label cancer. Although strides have been made through early detection and early treatment of some types of cancers and researchers have developed various drugs and treatments to extend the life expectancy of persons with cancer, we are still in the earliest stages of understanding what and why our cells begin and keep multiplying uncontrollably and then spread to other parts of the body. The realistic hope is that someday if not a cure, we may be able to treat cancer as just a chronic disease that is managed and controlled the same as other conditions. A panel of cancer survivors who are physicians are interviewed by Linda Ellerbee who is also a cancer survivor. This would be a wonderful documentary for all health care professionals who work with people with cancer to see. It is presented from the perspective of the person and family of those with cancer and follows four patients over time. As was pointed out at the end of the program, if you are under the age of 80 right now, the chances are good that you will have cancer in your lifetime. It is thought-provoking and a very good documentary from the perspective of the person with the disease."