Lung Cancer

2011-07-14T15:28:00.006+03:00

Lung cancer is a disease characterised by uncontrolled cell growth in tissues of the lung. Most cancers that start in lung, known as primary lung cancers, are carcinomas that derive from epithelial cells. The lungs are located in the chest. They help you breathe. When you breathe, air goes through your nose, down your windpipe (trachea), and into the lungs, where it spreads through tubes called bronchi. Most lung cancer begins in the cells that line these tubes.

There are two main types of lung cancer- small cell lung cancer and non small cell cancer.

It is caused due to many reason including smoking, passive smoking, and exposure to asbestos and radon gas.The most common cause of lung cancer is long-term exposure to tobacco smoke. The risk of getting lung cancer is increased if there is family history of lung cancer.

Treatment depends on the specific type of lung cancer. Each type is treated differently. Chemotherapy, radiation, and surgery may be needed.

Prognostic factors in non-small-cell lung cancer include presence or absence of pulmonary symptoms, tumor size, cell type (histology), degree of spread (stage) and metastases to multiple lymph nodes, and vascular invasion. For non-small-cell lung carcinoma (NSCLC), prognosis is generally poor. Prognostic factors in small-cell lung cancer include performance status, gender, stage of disease, and involvement of the central nervous system or liver at the time of diagnosis. For small-cell lung carcinoma, prognosis is also generally poor.

Cancer Treatment

2011-06-28T14:02:00.001+03:00

Cancer is a well known deadly disease that is cause due to the inability of some uncontrollably growing cells to die. More than 100 types of cancer have been identified till death, classified on the basis of the type of the intially affected cancer. Cancer treatment will never be a single "cure for cancer" anymore than there will be a single treatment for all infectious disease.

Cancer usually develops due to mutation in the gens of the cell making it. The cell goes on multiplying and does not die as it had to. Finally, it starts forming a mass. These mutation are caused by many different stimuli like x-rays, radiation, different chemical etc.

Cancer treatment can be treated by surgery,chemotherapy, radiation therapy, immunotherapy, Targeted therapies, Hormonal therapy, Angiogenesis inhibitors or other methods.

The choice of therapy depends upon the location and grade of the tumor and the stage of the disease, as well as the general state of the patient (performance status).

Surgery

In theory, non-hematological cancers can be cured if entirely removed by surgery, but this is not always possible. When the cancer has metastasized to other sites in the body prior to surgery, complete surgical excision is usually impossible. In some instances, surgery must be delayed until other treatments are able to shrink the tumor.

Radiation therapy

The goal of radiation therapy is to damage as many cancer cells as possible, while limiting harm to nearby healthy tissue. Hence, it is given in many fractions, allowing healthy tissue to recover between fractions.

Chemotherapy

Chemotherapy drugs interfere with cell division in various possible ways, e.g. with the duplication of DNA or the separation of newly formed chromosomes.

Targeted therapies

This constitutes the use of agents specific for the deregulated proteins of cancer cells. Small molecule targeted therapy drugs are generally inhibitors of enzymatic domains on mutated, over expressed, or otherwise critical proteins within the cancer cell. Photodynamic therapy (PDT) is a ternary treatment for cancer involving a photosensitizer, tissue oxygen, and light (often using lasers). PDT can be used as treatment for basal cell carcinoma (BCC) or lung cancer; PDT can also be useful in removing traces of malignant tissue after surgical removal of large tumors.

Immunotherapy

Cancer immunotherapy refers to a diverse set of therapeutic strategies designed to induce the patient's own immune system to fight the tumor

Hormonal therapy

Removing or blocking estrogen or testosterone is often an important additional treatment. In certain cancers, administration of hormone agonists, such as progestogens may be therapeutically beneficial.

Angiogenesis inhibitors

Angiogenesis inhibitors prevent the extensive growth of blood vessels (angiogenesis) that tumors require to survive. Some, such as bevacizumab, have been approved and are in clinical use. One of the main problems with anti-angiogenesis drugs is that many factors stimulate blood vessel growth in cells normal or cancerous.

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