Beyond cancer: a reflection on the narratives of nasopharyngeal carcinoma patients in Nagaland.

In the Three-year Report of the Population-Based Cancer Registries: 2012-2014 published by the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR 2016) [11], the incidence of nasopharyngeal carcinoma (NPC) in Nagaland has been ranked as the highest in the country and the second-highest globally next to China. With the paucity of literature and very few studies done on the high incidence of NPC among the Nagas in Nagaland, the present study was undertaken to understand and examine the experiences and perceptions of patients diagnosed with NPC and efforts were made to draw on their experiences with cancer care treatment through the thematic analysis of the ten in-depth interviews conducted. The patient's experiences with anxiety, fear, and distress due to NPC, its impact on the reconstruction of self, the coping mechanisms they develop in the form of resilience, personal attributes of hope and optimism, and the impact of religion and prayers in helping them deal with their disease are discussed in the paper.