Eating and drinking during the infusion

In most units, yes, and you should. Keeping something small going through the hours makes the day considerably easier, because an empty stomach makes sickness worse for most people and the session is longer than anyone expects.

Ask the nurse when you arrive, because units differ on whether food is allowed at the chair and some ask you to eat elsewhere. Either way, bring your own — canteens are frequently shut by the time you get a gap.

Drinking matters more than eating

Several chemotherapy drugs are cleared through the kidneys, and some schedules give extra fluids for that reason. Sipping through the session helps, and cutting back to avoid trips to the toilet is the one genuinely unhelpful thing you can do here.

You are eating food that has travelled, in a building full of unwell people, often on a day close to your low-count window. The ordinary rules apply with a little more care rather than less.

Hands first, every time

Wash with soap or use sanitiser before touching food, and again after handling the drip stand, door handles or a shared table. This is the measure that matters most and the one most often skipped when eating in a chair.

Nothing that has been standing

Food cooked that morning and carried for several hours in the heat is not the same as food cooked that morning and eaten at home. Pack dry items for a long day rather than anything that spoils.

Avoid the canteen and the street stall

Particularly during the low-count days. Pre-cut fruit, chaat, juice from a stall and buffet-style food are the ones to skip. Your own tiffin is almost always the safer option.

Do not share

Cups, spoons, water bottles or food with other patients, however friendly the room. It is an easy habit to fall into over hours in adjacent chairs, and it is worth avoiding.

Common, particularly if anxiety is high or the room smells of other people's food. Do not force it, and do not let it mean nothing at all goes in for eight hours.

Prioritise fluids

If solid food is impossible, keep sipping. Water, buttermilk, coconut water, or ice chips if even sipping is hard. Fluids matter more than food across a single day, and they matter particularly here.

Try very small amounts

A single biscuit, a few spoons of curd, half a banana. Something every couple of hours rather than a meal. An empty stomach is what makes sickness worse, and it takes very little to avoid one.

Say if sickness is the reason

Rather than quietly not eating. Anti-sickness medicine can be given into the line during the session, and if you are struggling to eat on treatment day that is worth knowing before your next cycle too.

Eat in the good hours instead

Something before you leave home, and something in the evening once you are back and settled. If the chair is impossible, shifting the eating either side of it is a reasonable answer.