October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month, and most of the public conversation this month rightly centers on screening and early detection. We want to spend some time on a part of the experience that gets less attention: what treatment itself costs patients, sometimes for years after the diagnosis is behind them.

The Symptom Burden Nobody Talks About Enough

Breast cancer patients on long-term hormone therapies, including aromatase inhibitors, often manage joint pain, nausea, fatigue, and disrupted sleep well into survivorship. These symptoms are common, persistent, and rarely the focus of public awareness campaigns, even though they shape daily life for a long time after active treatment ends.

What Our Research Adds

Our 2018 study, published in the European Journal of Internal Medicine, followed a large, unselected population of cancer patients using medical cannabis in real-world clinical practice. Patients reported improvements in pain, nausea, and overall quality of life, and the study has since been cited more than 260 times. We want to be clear that this research was not specific to breast cancer. It looked at cancer patients broadly. But the symptom burden it addresses, pain and nausea during cancer care, is exactly what so many breast cancer patients live with.

What This Is, and What It Isn’t

This is supportive care evidence: real-world data on how patients managed symptoms during treatment, not a claim about treating the cancer itself. We think that distinction is worth stating plainly rather than letting it blur, especially during a month built around awareness and accuracy.

Why This Matters for Survivorship Care

For healthcare professionals supporting breast cancer patients through and after treatment, symptom management deserves the same evidence-based attention as the treatment protocol itself. We are glad to see this awareness month bring more attention to the full experience of breast cancer, not just the diagnosis.

If you would like to talk through what our research shows for a specific patient population, our team is always happy to walk through it directly.