Cancer Symposium for Young Adults Offered

Fountain Valley Hospital and Regional Medical Center is offering a six-part cancer symposium for a group not typically associated with the disease: young adults.

The sessions, to start Feb. 12 and continue to April 23, are aimed at educating county cancer patients in their 20s and 30s about treatment while giving them a forum to voice their concerns about living with the disease, treatment and maintaining a career and family life through medical hardship.

“Younger patients may be uniquely challenged by the diagnosis and the threat of a shorter-than-expected life span,” said symposium facilitator Helen Franco, a USC graduate student in social work at the university’s Orange County campus in Irvine.

Speakers include disease survivors, Franco and Dr. Glen Justice, director of the regional cancer society. After next week, the group will meet on the second and fourth Wednesdays of each month through April 23.

Only cancer patients ages 20 to 40 are invited to attend the first symposium. Family, friends and the public might be invited to future sessions.

The first gathering is from 6:30 to 8 p.m. in the Living Care Center at the Fountain Valley hospital, 11250 Warner Ave. The event is free and dinner and refreshments will be provided.

Reservations are required.

Information: (714) 979-1408.