Val and Dennis Chapman know too well the stress and anxiety associated with cancer treatment.
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From long travel time, treatment side effects and the illness itself, they've seen it all through close family and friends.
Their daughter Karen is receiving treatment for bowel cancer while a neighbour is battling breast cancer. Val also lost both her sister and brother to forms of cancer.
Mrs Chapman highlighted some of the issues people face with cancer treatment.
"When our daughter has the chemo, she is sick on that day. She takes a few tablets and goes to bed.
"Lucky she is only doing it once a week but other people are doing it many more times than she is.
"It is a big stress for the family when you've got to catch a bus all the time to get there and home again," Mrs Chapman said.
There is some relief on the way for local patients, with Taree named as one of 13 locations across Australia to benefit from the Federal Government's regional radiation therapy services expansion.
The expansion was announced in last week's budget and will be guaranteed if the government is successful at the election on May 18.
Member for Lyne Dr David Gillespie said the growing population needs closer access to services and a specialised radiation oncology unit in the heart of Taree will do just that.
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A local unit would eliminate extra travel to treatment services, a heavy burden for cancer patients and their families.
"There's 92,800 people living here and they shouldn't have to travel and dislocate to travel down to the Mater in Newcastle or up to Port Macquarie and spend three hours a day travelling when you have weeks and weeks of radiation therapy.
"A course of radiation therapy may take three to four weeks, depending on what sort of cancer you are getting treated for.
"We're a growing region and we deserve to have the best," Dr Gillespie said.
A location for the unit is yet to be determined, with ongoing local developments from the State Government, such as the Manning Hospital redevelopment and plans for a public hospital in the Great Lakes, to play a factor.
This will continue to be negotiated, with tenders for building the unit expected to go out imminently if successful at the election.
Dr Gillespie said Federal funding will focus on infrastructure, radiation machines and medical personnel.
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