'I don't think I'd be here talking to you': N.S. woman says being active during cancer journey helped her heal

Rosanne Briand says it’s important to share her cancer journey as a way to inspire others to move more.

The 69-year-old Nova Scotia woman was diagnosed with Stage 4 lung cancer just over a year ago.

“I’m feeling much better, this year,” she says. “If you saw me last year at this time, I wouldn’t have been looking as good.

Rosanne says news of her diagnosis was shocking. She never felt short of breath, and says she has never smoked.

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“I didn’t ask how long they were giving me, but they put me in palliative care,” she explains. “I lost a lot of weight, I wasn’t able to walk very shortly after I had a radiation treatment, couldn’t eat, wasn’t sleeping well. So, I was a mess.”

Targeted therapy followed in her treatment plan.

Rosanne says although she was so weak, she pushed herself to do something more.

In January, she contacted the Physical Activity and Cancer [PAC] Lab at the QEII Health Sciences Centre.

“It’s amazing to see people like Rosanne come into the program and when they start and they roll in in a wheelchair and then next thing you know, they’re doing squats and push ups and all kinds of things, bouncing on rebounders,” explains Tom Christensen, clinical exercise physiologist and research co-ordinator at the PAC lab.

Tom says the lab offers a number of programs and studies for people living with and beyond cancer.

“Exercise is really good as a pre-habilitative tool, to help people maintain or improve fitness before they start treatment,” he explains. “They definitely maintain fitness or mitigate declines in fitness when they’re on treatment, and then post-treatment, trying to bring them back to where they were before, sometimes even better physically than they were before with exercise.”

Tom encourages cancer patients at the QEII Health Sciences Centre to visit the PAC Lab, which is located in the Dickson building, or to visit their website for more information.

“It’s our hope that someday everybody who gets a cancer diagnosis is just going to be referred into the cancer care exercise program,” he explains. “For now, we are kind of this niche research model within Nova Scotia Health and the QEII Foundation has given us funding to run the program and we hope that it continues to grow as we move forward.”

Rosanne says after 12 weeks at the PAC lab she gave back her wheelchair and got on with her life.

She says she is eternally grateful for all the care she received and continues to receive at the QEII Health Sciences Centre.

“It takes a team of people to make you better when you have cancer,” she says. “I don’t think I’d be here talking to you today, honestly. I really don’t think I’d be here talking to you – because I think that changed my life.”

For more Nova Scotia news, visit our dedicated provincial page.