“It makes it very very easy.”
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These are the words of Mount Gambier resident Graham McDonald who has made Warrnambool’s Rotary House his home for eight weeks.
Mr McDonald has prostate cancer and finished his radiotherapy treatment at the cancer centre this week.
He said the staff at the centre and Rotary House had been great and helped make his cancer journey that bit easier.
It was while at Rotary House he met Peter Schutz, from Moorak just outside Mount Gambier, who is also having radiotherapy treatment for prostate cancer.
Mr Schutz occupies most of his spare time at the onsite Peter’s Project Community Support Centre, where patients and their families can relax, read or use the internet in between appointments.
The retired farmer can’t say enough about the volunteers who look after him with a cuppa and a piece of slice. “I stop over in the cancer centre and do jigsaw puzzles all day. I come back to Rotary House, have a feed and go back and do the same thing the next day. It’s been great for me.”
Mr Schutz asked about accommodation at the cancer centre and “they organised it all”. “It was virtually come over here and not worry about whether you’re going to get a bed,” he said.
“They’ve all been bloody great. From the nurse in the radiation ward to the radiologist, they can’t do enough for you.
“If you’ve got something going wrong they want to know about it. I reckon it’s the most swishy suave building that I’ve seen for a long time. It’s well designed.”
He said hearing he had cancer was a shock but he’s philosophical. “Whatever will be will be. I’ve got full trust in the machines and the people who operate them. It’s no good worrying about it. It’s not going to go away or change anything. You just take it one step at a time, that’s all you can do.”
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