FIGHTING CANCER
Pandemic Complicates Fight Against Cancer
FI GHTING CANCER
JESSE BERNSTEIN | JE STAFF
SINCE MARCH, Mimi
Ferraro has experienced losses
big and small.

She lost her mother, Joan
Polin, who died of COVID-
19, alone in a hospital. As a
chaplain for Abramson Senior
Care, she lost access to her older
Jewish patients. As a rabbi to
Congregation Tiferes B’Nai
Israel, she lost in-person contact
with her congregants during
the High Holidays. For a time,
she lost the comfort of selecting
her own produce at the grocery
store. But as a chemotherapy patient
at Fox Chase Cancer Center,
where she recently passed the
two-year mark of chemotherapy
sessions for her stage 4 colon
cancer, the quality of care,
thankfully, has stayed the same.

Even there, though, Ferraro can’t
have her husband or daughter
with her to ask questions and
take notes from the doctor.

She can’t see her doctors’ faces
behind their masks; she’s not
sure that she would recognize
them on the street.

She’d just like things to feel
normal again.

“But even when we go back
to whatever normal is, I still
feel like I’m extra vulnerable,”
Ferraro said.

Cancer care is already a
tricky proposition for patients,
their families, doctors and
hospital workers. Th e intermin-
gled processes of treatment have
been complicated even further
by the pandemic. And beyond
the world of doctors, nurses and
patients actively fi ghting cancer,
off shoots like screening services
and chaplaincy have been
aff ected as well.

Dr. Jeff rey Farma, a surgical
oncologist at Fox Chase Cancer
Center, is thankful that he and
his patients have been able
to see one another in person
as much as they have, even
if the process of an in-person
visit now involves tests, masks
and other PPE. And to be able
to see patients via telehealth,
diff erent as it may be for both
parties, is better than nothing.

But it’s still a notable diver-
gence from the way he learned
how to care for people.

“Part of what I love about
what I do is the relationships
Name: Rothkoff Law Group
Width: 3.625 in
Depth: 3.62 in
Color: Black plus one
Comment: 10/8-JE News- Cancer Awareness
LIFE CARE PLANNING | ESTATE PLANNING | MEDICAID
LONG TERM CARE ADVOCACY | ASSET PROTECTION
VIRTUAL SUPPORT VIA PHONE & VIDEO CONFERENCE
(856) 616-2923 NEW JERSEY
(215) 546-5800 PENNSYLVANIA
| ROTHKOFFLAW.COM
REQUEST A FREE SENIOR GUIDE
Solving Elder Care Law Issues with Respect and Compassion
24 OCTOBER 8, 2020
I’ve built over the years with
my patients and their families,
and seeing them and getting
hugs, and frequently kisses, and
shaking hands and the physical
contact,” he said. “A lot of my
patients have become family,
and it goes both ways. And so
that becomes very diffi cult.”
Respectfully declining a hug
from a older Jewish patient, one
who reminds him of his own
grandmother, was just one of
these hard moments. Farma’s
patients can’t even have visitors.

Dr. Richard Bleicher, also of
Fox Chase, explained that the
Temple Health system quickly
recognized the risk that COVID
would pose to immunocom-
promised patients, which
includes those with cancer. Fox
Chase was declared a COVID-
free zone, and patients who
developed coronavirus were
transferred elsewhere in the
system for treatment.

“It was just a Herculean eff ort
on their part,” Bleicher said. Of
course, even though the hospital
is “COVID-free,” it exists in the
reality shaped by the disease.

Consequently, Bleicher has found
himself treating his patients’ fears
about the pandemic alongside
the cancers that they’re already
affl icted with.

In addition to the changes
made in visitor policy, Fox
Chase turned attention toward
its order of care procedures,
creating new schedules of
therapies and surgeries that
minimized risk for patients.

Telehealth, which can keep
vulnerable patients at home for
visits that don’t necessarily need
to be in person, is one example.

Dr. Mark Morginstin, an
attending physician in oncology
and hematology in the Einstein
Healthcare Network, believes
that those telehealth visits are
here to stay. Th ere are obvious
positives, he believes, but he
knows that it’s a new experi-
ence, for doctors and patients
alike; toward the beginning of
JEWISH EXPONENT
Dr. Jeff rey Farma explained how
diffi cult it is to stay distant from
his patients, many of whom have
become like family.

Courtesy of Fox Chase Cancer Center
the pandemic, patient satisfac-
tion scores were down as a result
of the perceived impersonality
of a video chat, in his view.

Th ose scores have since recov-
ered, but Morginstin misses the
in-person visits.

“I’ve been doing this for
many years, and I like to have
people in front of me,” he said.

“You get to see their expres-
sions of their face, you get to
see if there’s something really
going on. You don’t get that
over the phone; even on a
video, you may not get that. So
I really think it’s not the best
way to do medicine. Th is is not
how things are meant to be.”
Elaine Grobman, CEO of
Susan G. Komen Philadelphia,
is concerned that certain short-
term eff ects of the pandemic
could become lasting. Grobman
is troubled by stories she hears
about more and more women
delaying their mammograms,
increasing the risk that they
won’t be able catch signs of
breast cancer at an early stage.

“I’ve spent 30 years educating
women about the importance of
early detection and treatment,”
Grobman said. “Delaying
getting your mammogram puts
you in a diffi cult spot if there’s
something going on.”
She hopes that women who
feel comfortable doing so will
Dr. Mark Morginstin believes that
telehealth is here to stay.

Courtesy of Einstein Healthcare Network
soon return to such risk-miti-
gating practices.

Doctors and patients aren’t
the only ones with reservations
about telehealth.

Rabbi Tsurah August, a
chaplain with Jewish Family
and Children’s Service of
Greater Philadelphia for 12
years, is still trying to fi gure out
how best to be emotionally and
spiritually present for patients
requesting her services at a time
when she can’t be physically
present. It’s no idle question for
her; so many connections have
been forged in her line of work,
she said, through a hand laid
on an arm. Like Morginstin,
August said that she strives
to make patients she inter-
acts with become much more
than someone to whom she is
providing a service.

August has found that the
phone skills she gained as a
management consultant a few
careers ago have served her
well. Still, she’s looking forward
to being in person again.

“One of the feedback loops in
doing this work that wasn’t true in
management consulting is there
is this reciprocity,” she said. “Not
the thank-you’s, but that when I
would look into someone’s eyes,
they’d look into mine.” ●
jbernstein@jewishexponent.com; 215-832-0740
JEWISHEXPONENT.COM



Name: Brandywine Senior Living ***Thi
Width: 9.25 in
Depth: 11 in
Color: Black plus one
Comment: JE Cancer Awareness 10/8
Ad Number: 00091750
but still with friends.

OVATED CO
N M
RE ITY
UN M
NEW LY
Social and Safe...

PUB & NEW
SERENADE WING
SI S C
at our
DRESHER T
NOW OPEN
H E D COMMUNITY V I
U LE OU R
Y Call Lori or Catherine at 215.591.4000
1405 North Limekiln Pike | Dresher, PA 19025
JEWISHEXPONENT.COM JEWISH EXPONENT
OCTOBER 8, 2020
25