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The forms of cancer are very different and there is no single miracle cure for them, but the medical advancement is tremendous. Cancer can be lived longer and longer, and more and more often it is simply a chronic disease. What are modern cancer treatments?
Although too many people still die from cancer, there are more and more examples that cancer can be won.Tumorwas defeated by Irena Santor, Anna Seniuk, Zofia Kucówna, Agata Buzek, Krystyna Kofta, Robert Gawliński and Jan Kobuszewski. Krzysztof Kolberger, an outstanding actor and an extraordinary person, survived with cancer for 20 years. His doctor and friend, oncologist Cezary Szczylik, said that it wasn'tcancerthat beat him. The actor died as a result of unexpected complications that could have happened to anyone. The problems we face every day, even treating banal diseases, do not always allow us to objectively look at the changes and progress that have been made inoncologyover the last 20 years. And a lot has changed, although doctors still use three basic methods of fighting cancer. The oldest method of treating neoplastic diseases is surgery. The second is radiation therapy and the third is pharmacotherapy. The first two methods limit their impact to a specific area of our body. Medicines used in oncology have a chance to reach every cell of the body. This creates extraordinary treatment options for neoplastic diseases which - as is the case in hematology - never occur in only one place in the body. Medicines that enter the bloodstream can reach all organs and cells of the body. As a result, they destroy cancer cells.
Cancer is no longer a sentence
In the last 20 years, we have learned to effectively treat some types of cancer. Examples include chronic myeloid leukemia, cancers of the gastrointestinal tract or disseminated ovarian cancer. Until recently, the diagnosis of one of these cancers was a death sentence. Currently, using classical or modern chemotherapy, a significant number of patients can be cured or treated for many years. Even a dozen or so years ago, there was little to offer to a patient with metastases. Treatment was focused on alleviating symptoms, and patients died within months. Today they are differentpossibilities. A good example of this is disseminated kidney cancer. Classic chemotherapy did not help the patients. The last 3 years have brought drugs that, even with advanced cancer, can extend life by several years. Another example is multiple myeloma. Several years ago, the patient struggled with numerous fractures, he often had to use a wheelchair to reduce the bone destruction process. Today, already at the diagnosis of the disease, treatment can be applied that completely or significantly reduces bone destruction. The next stage of myeloma treatment were bone marrow transplants. But now, in some patients, pharmaceuticals - modern or long-used ones - can be used instead of transplants - further studies reveal their previously unknown effects. Even if the patient's life cannot be significantly lengthened yet, it is possible to significantly influence the quality of his life. Doctors know ways to effectively treat patients with prostate and breast cancer with the early initiation of therapy. More and more people are living more than 5 years after treatment for lymphomas, leukemias, cancers of the thyroid gland, testicles, and skin. But the list of cancers that still win over modern medicine is long. These include pancreatic, liver, stomach and lung cancer. Here, the treatment progress looks more modest, which does not mean that they are not there.
Cancer treatment no longer causes so many ailments
Cancer treatment is burdened with many complications. Hair loss, nausea, vomiting, skin changes, anemia - these are just a few of them. Modern medicine works well with most of them. By administering chemotherapy drugs, vomiting can be stopped or greatly reduced. The role of psychotherapy in oncological treatment was also appreciated. It is no longer surprising that a patient convinced of the treatment, understanding its hardships and effects, has fewer unpleasant symptoms. As progress, more and more oncology drugs are in the form of tablets that can be taken at home, without the need for frequent hospital visits and without the risk of damaging the veins due to drips.
Cancer treatment: modern surgery
It would seem that the smallest progress has been made in oncological surgery. Tumors are still removed during surgery, but today it is possible to excise them without extensive surgery. Microsurgical methods, laparoscopy, special probes that can be used to operate on brain tumors and many others have become permanent fixtures in oncological practice. The therapeutic effect is the same as in the case of extensive surgery, but the benefit for the patient is faster recovery and less psychological damage. Savers can be an example herebreast surgery. Although they do not affect life expectancy after surgery, they significantly improve its comfort.
Cancer treatment: precise radiation therapy
Modern radiotherapy, thanks to the three-dimensional determination of the irradiation site, allows you to destroy diseased tissue, but save he althy tissue. During the irradiation process, only the tumor receives a concentrated dose of rays. This is important for some cancers, such as those of the prostate that develops near the intestines. The radiation could easily damage them. Knowing the sensitivity of individual tumors to radiation, the doctor may adjust the radiation dose (in time and intensity) in order not to give the tumor time to grow back. Intraoperative radiotherapy (in patients with tumors within the abdominal cavity, in some cancers of the reproductive organs) is also increasingly used. The concentrated beam of rays destroys invisible micrometastases, which reduces the risk of relapse.
ImportantHow many are cured
According to international standards, a person who survives 5 years after cancer treatment is considered cured. Even 20 years ago, the percentage of survivors of this period was not impressive. Currently, there are 12 million people in the USA who have beaten cancer, and in Poland - 600,000. The long way of the drug According to the reports of the US Drug and Food Agency (FDA), only one in 5 thousand. of the developed anti-cancer preparations is released for sale.
Cancer treatment: targeted chemistry
Classic chemotherapy can be used in a strictly defined period of time due to the high toxicity of the treatment. When it brings the body more losses than benefits, it must be discontinued. Therefore, targeted therapies, i.e. those that directly hit cancer cells, are considered to be a great therapeutic success. By administering appropriate drugs, cancer cells can be killed by two methods. The first is to cut off the blood supply to the tumor. When he is deprived of the food he drew from his blood, he dies of hunger because he cannot make his own blood vessels. The second method is to hit the cancer cell directly and stop it from reproducing. This is extremely important because cancer cells are immortal by themselves and can reproduce endlessly. Contrary to he althy cells, diseased cells do not undergo apoptosis, i.e. the process of self-destruction. The current knowledge about the development and "habits" of cancer cells allows drugs to reach these places in cells, from where the signal for their constant reproduction flows, that is at the molecular level of the cell. Targeted therapies are increasingly used to treat lung, colon and kidney cancer. However, you must remember thatmodern drugs must be used together with other elements of anti-cancer therapy, e.g. with surgery. Only then can they be effective.
Old cancer drugs like new
Extending life with cancer is also aimed at multi-drug therapies, also known as combination therapies. After years of research, it has been proven that the simultaneous administration of several well-known anti-cancer drugs can significantly improve the effectiveness of treatment. Moreover, research into the biology of cancer has led to interesting conclusions that the old drug, e.g. the infamous anti-emetic thalidomide, which was taken by pregnant women, caused limb hypoplasia in the developing fetus, and when administered to patients with multiple myeloma, it effectively fights this cancer of the circulatory system. because it blocks the formation of blood vessels.
Tailor-made cancer treatment
It is also one of the trends in modern oncology. It has been shown that cancer treatment and the risk of metastasis differ from person to person with the same type of cancer. The tendency to metastasis does not manifest itself with the progression of the disease, as was thought until recently, but is embedded in it from the very beginning. It is determined by the activity of specific genes of cancer cells. Hence the idea that the therapy should be adapted to the patient's needs, because the cancer arises from his cells. It is also important why the cells began to behave abnormally in a given person. Using highly sensitive molecular studies, you can look at the genes in a cancer cell and compare them with those in a he althy one. Changes can be detected that will emphasize the risk of rapid metastasis. Find out why some people get more sick and others get milder. Breast cancer is an example of predicting the future of the disease. It was shown that women with HER2-positive breast cancer had a lower chance of long-term survival compared to those who did not. But giving women with HER2 trastuzumab changed their fate. The chances of both groups of patients have become even. Controversial, but also feasible is preventive surgery, which is used in women with a confirmed and documented family history of genetic predisposition to cancer.
Problem100 percent cures
Such prognosis is provided by cancer diagnosed in the pre-invasive stage. However, in Poland, most patients come to the care of oncological centers only in the third and fourth stages of the disease, which affects the effects of treatment and worsens the prognosis. Many tumors can no longer be operated on, metastases appear, which lead to the most dangerous complications. Therefore, you need to regularly undergo preventive examinations:detection of a tumor one clinical stage earlier gives 25 percent. more chances of a permanent cure.
Future: cancer vaccine
Intensive work on cancer vaccines is ongoing. The work goes in two directions. The first is to create a vaccine to protect against disease recurrence, and the second - to prevent the development of the disease through vaccinations. Currently, a vaccine is used against the human papillomavirus, which causes cervical cancer. It is difficult to predict what the future of this form of fighting cancer will be like. Scientists are increasingly saying that it will not be possible to create a single vaccine that will teach the immune system to recognize and destroy cancer cells. The body can fight them, but it is still unknown why it resigns at some point and the disease can develop.
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