Cancer and serious mental illness: cancer and you

Stopping or reducing your smoking can significantly reduce your risk of lung cancer, mouth and throat cancers, and many other cancers. Even if you have smoked for a long time, cutting down or giving up smoking will dramatically reduce your risk of cancer in the future, as well as boosting your overall health and wellbeing.

For people with serious mental illness living in south east London, specialist support is available to help you give up smoking at South East London and the Maudsley NHS Trust. If you are being cared for by a different mental health service, speak to your care coordinator or other clinician about the support available to you.

You should always speak to your mental health team if you are planning to smoke less (or more) as it may significantly impact on how your body reacts to some mental health medications.

If you are overweight, losing weight will reduce your risks of a wide range of cancers. In fact, being overweight is the second biggest cause of cancer.

Many people with serious mental illness find it difficult to maintain a healthy weight. Some drugs used to treat serious mental illnesses can cause weight gain. Because of this, almost all mental health services employ dietitians. Dietitians are specialist healthcare professionals who support you to meet your nutritional needs and manage your weight in the way that works best for you. If you’re interested in losing weight, you should speak to your GP who can help you access a dietitian or weight management programme. You can also contact your mental health team to find out what support is available to you.

You can also find out if you might be overweight by using an interactive tool on the NHS website, or speaking to your GP.

Combining a healthier diet with more exercise will help you to lose weight and keep it off. Some top tips include:

• Aiming to be active for at least 150 minutes in total every week.
• Trying to make sure you have your 5 A Day of fruit and vegetables. Fresh, frozen or tinned fruit and vegetables all count. Find out more about 5 A Day on the NHS website.
• Switching sugary drinks to low sugar drinks or water. Having too much sugar can make you gain weight, and it can be easy to drink more sugar than you are realising in fizzy drinks or sports drinks. A single 500ml bottle of cola can contain 13.5 teaspoons of sugar, which is more than double the recommended maximum amount of sugar you should be consuming each day.
• Checking food labels to help you make healthier choices. Many foods have labels like the one shown below on their packet. A good rule is to try and “choose less red, go for green instead”. This is because red on these labels shows the food is higher in fat, saturated fat, sugar or salt – all of which can be bad for you if you’re having too much of them. Find out more on more on labels on the British Heart Foundation website.

Nutritional label from biscuit packaging with table that displays energy, fat, carbohydrate, fibre, protein and salt values.​​​​​​

Eating and drinking a healthier and more balanced diet can help you to reduce your risk of cancer. Most of this is related to maintaining a healthier weight, which is explored in the previous section of this learning resource. As well as eating a balanced diet, there are two extra ways in which you can reduce your risks of cancer through your diet:

• Eating more high-fibre foods. These help you to have more regular bowel movements, which can reduce your risks of some bowel cancers. Getting more fibre can be simple, for example eating more fruit and vegetables or switching from white to brown rice, or white bread to wholegrain. Find out more about high fibre foods on the Cancer Research UK website.
• Eating less red or processed meat. Cutting down the amount of red meat (such as beef, lamb or pork) and processed meat (such as ham, sausages or bacon) can reduce your risk of some sorts of cancer. The NHS recommends having no more than 70g of red or processed meat per day.

Sometimes, you will see claims about the cancer-curing or cancer-preventing properties of foods in the news or online. Much of the evidence around these so-called “superfoods” is quite weak. You are likely to have a much more positive impact on your health by having a consistent balanced diet than focusing on eating a particular food or supplement. Find out more on the Royal Marsden website, or speak to a health professional if you are ever unsure about a food or supplement.

Drinking alcohol increases your risks of a number of different cancers. If you drink alcohol, reducing how much you drink will reduce your risks of some cancers.

There are lots of ways to reduce your drinking in manageable steps. If you’re drinking regularly, you could try having “drink free days” every week, or using smaller glasses. You could also try lower alcohol or alcohol-free versions of your preferred drinks.

Every small step will make a big difference over time. For support, speak to your mental health team, your GP, or have a look at online NHS information.

The main way in which being physically active can reduce your risks of some cancers is through helping you maintain a healthy weight. As well as this, being active might help to reduce your risks of bowel or breast cancer, and will boost your overall health and wellbeing.

The NHS recommends trying to be active for at least 150 minutes in total over the course of every week. However, if you’re less physically active at the moment, any activity is a good thing.

Try and aim for:

• 30 minutes of aerobic activity at least 5 days a week. Aerobic activity is anything that makes you feel slightly out of breath and your heart beat faster. This could include going for a brisk walk, jogging or swimming.
• Strength-based activities at least twice a week. This could include using resistance machines at a gym, climbing stairs or doing exercises such as squats or push-ups with your body weight at home.

The charity, MIND, have resources designed to help people with mental health conditions to be physically active. You could also speak to your GP or mental health team about social prescribing related to exercise. A social prescriber can connect you with non-medical activities in your community. This could include exercise groups, gym sessions or other organised physical activity. Watch this video to learn more about social prescribing.

Some mental health services in south east London also have exercise facilities you might be able to use. For example, Bethlem Hospital has an outdoor gym which is free to use.