Pancreatic Cancer It Can Be Lethal If Not Caught In Time
There are a lot of places a tumor can develop in. That includes the pancreas. A malignant tumor can reach the smallest pancreas organ and create problems for a person’s health and life. Pancreatic cancer is often caused by the wrong diet, too much vice such as smoking and alcohol. All these dirty intakes pile up, thus creating a possible infection in the pancreas.
In the United States, 42,000+ individuals are expected to be diagnosed with this condition in 2009.
Symptoms are not specific and vary from one person to another. There’s also no telling what the specific cause is but there are risk factors for those who are possible to get it. Pancreatic cancer is also referred to as exocrine cancer.
Risk factors for pancreatic cancer are:
– Age, the older the higher the chances
– Mostly men, women are rarely diagnosed
– African-American, Caucasians are less likely to be diagnosed
– A carnivorous diet or mostly meat, vegans’ diet is not obliterated by the tumor
– Smoker
– Obese or Over Weight
– Diabetic
– Exposed to dyes and pesticides or chemicals that are associated to gasoline
– Ocnogene or family history of the ailment.
The common symptoms for pancreatic cancer are:
– Pain in the upper abdomen and/or upper back
– Loss of appetite
– Extreme weight loss
– Jaundice which causes dark urine, yellow eyes, and yellow skin
– Dilation of the gall bladder
– Nausea and vomiting
Take note that jaundice, although painless, takes place when the tumor has grown and its pressure becomes an obstruction to the bile duct. This causes abdominal pain to the affected person.
When the patient feels the mentioned symptoms, it is best that he go to a hospital and have a Physical Exam, lab test, CT Scan and an Ultrasonography performed.
Like ovarian cancer, treatment of pancreatic cancer depends on the stage the tumor is in.
Stages of Pancreatic Cancer:
– Local or Resectable Stage
Here, the disease is merely confined to the pancreas. It is separated from the blood vessels that are around the area.
Treatment is surgery. Other options are postoperative chemotherapy.
Based on previous cases, the survival time for those who are at this stage are 17 to 19 months.
– Locally Advanced or Unresectable Stage
At this stage, the cancer is encased or compressed the blood vessels that surround the pancreas.
Treatment is chemotherapy with or without radiation.
Those who are experiencing this stage of pancreatic cancer are predicted to survive for 8 to 9 months.
– Metastatic Stage
This is the worst stage of pancreatic cancer because the infection has already spread into the other organs such as the lungs and the liver.
Chemotherapy is the treatment: Survival for those at this stage are 4 to 6 months.
Notice that once a person has pancreatic cancer the chances for survival are not good. The time that a person can combat this cancer depends on the stage that the cancer is in, along with how effective the treatment can be.
Sometimes when the patient does survive the cancer, there’s also a chance that they go back because the cancer has returned yet again. Sad to think about it but once you have pancreatic cancer, it’s really hard to be cured from it.
That is why it is often advised to everyone to be very careful of what they eat. Too much oil in food is not good in anyone’s health. So is too much alcohol. Smoking is also a problem. People who take in too much oil and fat, smoke and drink a lot have a high risk of having pancreatic cancer.