Cancer, Trauma, and Healing the Whole Person

For millions of patients with cancer, a diagnosis doesn’t just bring a physical battle. It can trigger a trauma response that can linger long after treatment ends, reshaping how people sleep, think, and connect with the world around them.

Bridget Vazquez, PsyD, is a clinical health psychologist at City of Hope, where she works within the Department of Supportive Care Medicine and focuses on improving quality of life for patients, families, and caregivers navigating cancer from diagnosis through survivorship. From this vantage point, she sees what too often gets missed: posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) hiding in plain sight, disguised as chemo fatigue, written off as normal worry, or simply never screened for.

In this episode, she breaks down how cancer-related PTSD actually shows up, why it goes unrecognized, and what patients, caregivers, and clinicians can do about it.

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