Manishi Khatter thought she was through the worst of it. After being diagnosed with breast cancer, she had a lumpectomy and radiation, finishing her treatment just before Christmas in 2023.
Then, in January, she noticed her left breast and chest wall felt swollen. It could have been slow healing, but Khatter - a family doctor who works in women's health - suspected something worse.
By March the upper part of her left arm was swollen too, and she knew it was lymphedema, a chronic and debilitating condition that affects 1.25 million Canadians, most of them cancer survivors.
"My first reaction was, There must be a solution, this isn't going to be my life forever.' Then I started to realize, OK, maybe it is, because this is long term,'" Khatter recalls.
