Advanced cancer

This information has been prepared to help you understand more about advanced cancer – a cancer that has spread, come back, or is at a late stage when found (diagnosed). If cancer spreads beyond where it first started (the primary site), it may be called secondary, metastatic, stage 4 or advanced cancer. Cancer that has come back is called a recurrence or relapse. People may find out they have advanced cancer when it is first diagnosed. We call all these situations “advanced cancer”.

This information has been prepared to help you understand more about grief when someone close to you has died from cancer. Everyone’s experience of grief is different, so these pages offer a general guide only. While we hope you find this information helpful, some sections may stir up a range of feelings. You may like to read the sections that seem useful now and leave the rest until you’re ready.

This page provides information for people who are dying with cancer, and the people who are caring for them. If you have had cancer diagnosed at a late stage, or if the treatments have stopped working and remission is no longer possible, you may be told that the cancer is end stage or terminal. Everyone copes in their own way with this news.