Support Care Cancer (2005) 13: 929–937 DOI 10.1007/s00520-005-0805-8 ORIGINAL ARTICLE Lee W. Jones Kerry S. Courneya Carolyn Peddle John R. Mackey Received: 1 November 2004 Accepted: 1 March 2005 Published online: 27 September 2005 # Springer-Verlag 2005 Oncologists’ opinions towards recommending exercise to patients with cancer: a Canadian national survey Abstract Rationale: The goal of this study was to examine oncologists’ attitudes towards recommending ex- ercise to patients with cancer during treatment. Patients and methods: Using a national survey, all 659 practicing medical and radiation oncologists in Canada were sent a brief questionnaire. Results: The response rate was 46% (281/610). The majority of oncologists agreed that exercise was beneficial (62.0%), important (55.8%) and safe (63.1%) for patients with cancer during treatment. Forty-three percent of oncologists reported that they tried to recommend exercise to their pa- tients when appropriate. Moreover, oncologists actually reported recom- mending exercise to 28% of their patients during the past month. Ana- lyses also indicated significant differ- ences between oncologists, with younger, female, and medical oncol- ogists generally having more favor- able attitudes towards exercise for patients with cancer than their older, male, and radiation oncology coun- terparts. Conclusions: Oncologists have a favorable attitude toward recommending exercise to patients with cancer although several impor- tant barriers may prevent oncologists from providing exercise advice to their patients. Further research is required evaluating the effectiveness of interventions and strategies designed to improve oncologists’ confidence and ability to advise their patients on exercise during oncology consultations. Keywords Oncologist attitudes . Exercise . Survey Introduction In recent years increased attention has focused on the potential role of exercise as a supportive therapy for patients following a cancer diagnosis. In fact, several randomized controlled trials provide promising preliminary evidence that exercise training may enhance several physiologic outcomes including functional capacity [1–3], metabolic profile [4], and body composition [5–7] and alleviate a broad range of debilitating cancer-related symptoms such as fatigue [1, 8–10] and nausea [11]. Given this evidence, interventions to increase exercise levels in patients with cancer are clearly important. Similar to the persuasive impact of physicians and other health care professionals on promoting exercise in sedentary, asymptomatic pop- ulations [12], several observational [13, 14] and one recent randomized controlled trial [15] have provided preliminary evidence suggesting that oncologists may play a similar important role in enhancing exercise levels in patients with cancer. Although there is evidence to suggest that patients with cancer are highly motivated to receive exercise information from their oncologist in the period immediately after diag- nosis and initial treatments [16, 17], there is no information regarding oncologists’ attitudes towards recommending exercise to patients with cancer. Given that cancer affects a broad range of adults and children, the medical/demo- graphic characteristics and associated therapies and side effects vary dramatically across different cancer popula- tions. As such, the medical appropriateness and barriers to Paper presented in part at the 40th Annual Meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology, New Orleans, LA, June 2004. L. W. Jones (*) Department of Medicine, Duke University Medical Center, Durham, NC, USA e-mail: lee.w.jones@duke.edu Tel.: +1-919-6686791 Fax: +1-919-6814785 K. S. Courneya . C. Peddle Faculty of Physical Education, University of Alberta, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada J. R. Mackey Department of Medical Oncology, Cross Cancer Institute, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada