Shame and Pain: Lung Cancer’s Stigma Exerts Psychic and Physical Toll.

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Lung cancer kills more than 150,000 Americans each year, accounting for a quarter of all cancer deaths, and remains the nation’s No. 1 cancer killer. Though few survive it – just 4.5% to 8% remain alive the five years following their diagnoses – stigma and shame surrounding the disease are rampant.

Although many patients with lung cancer were smokers, even those who never took a puff – like University of Virginia nurse scientist Lee Ann Johnson’s mother, Donna King, who died of the disease in 2008 – often feel chastened by others and blamed for their disease. That stigma, Johnson found in her research, not only robs them of quality of life, it makes them less likely to seek relief in palliative and end-of-life care, a tide of suffering Johnson hopes to turn.

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