Childhood cancer survivors' and their parents' experiences with participation in a physical and social intervention during cancer treatment: A RESPECT study.

The interviews were with 18 survivors and 19 parents selected from one intervention group, so they may not represent all children with cancer. 61% were former leukaemia patients because the study deliberately included long treatment episodes, so findings may not transfer to other cancers. Survivors were interviewed 1 to 5 years after treatment, so recall of hospital sessions may be incomplete. Parents may have been influenced by their child's current activity level and by wanting to appear supportive of physical activity. Two authors had worked as physical activity professionals with the survivors, creating a potential bias, although an independent interviewer was used and those authors were excluded from analysis. Participants had to speak Danish and did not have cognitive dysfunction, so more impaired or non-Danish-speaking families were not included. The study describes experiences and perceptions, not measured effects of the intervention.

Funding was provided by the Danish Childhood Cancer Foundation, The Danish Cancer Society, The Novo Nordisk Foundation, Lundbeck Foundation, Toyota Foundation, Familien Hede Nielsens Foundation, ML Jørgensen and Gunnar Hansens Foundation, Arvid Nilssons Foundation, and Aase og Ejnar. The authors declared no conflict of interest.

Do not read these experiences as proof that supervised activity, peer visits, or cancer education alone improved outcomes. The components were delivered together, and the study did not test their separate effects.