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What Treatments Are Available For Victims Of Mesothelioma?
By Randall
Mesothelioma is touted as deadly because most of the casesare diagnosed when in advanced stage and doctors have littlesolace to offer by then. Still doctors try to do their bestto relieve the patients from severe pain of mesotheliomausing advanced treatments. Surgery Before considering surgery as one of the propositions forthe treatment of malignant cancer, the health of the patientneeds to be carefully evaluated. The tests are performed tocheck whether the cancer has spread to other parts of thebody or not. Also evaluation of the patient's lung and heartfunctions is done. In case of the former, a mesotheliomasurgery cannot be performed. Both the heart and lungs needto be properly functioning state for surgery to take place. Surgery is of two types: aggressive surgery (long-termcontrol) and palliative procedures (relief of symptoms).Let's define each of them separately. Aggressive surgery Aggressive surgery involves removal of the lung, the pleura,the diaphragm and the pericardium by a procedure, which isknown as extra pleural pneumonectomy. The intention tofollow this method is to physically remove as much of thetumor as possible. It is in fact adopting a bold method todo away with the disease-hence the name is "Aggressivesurgery". This surgery is extremely complicated and involves highrisk. This is because of the fact that there are possiblechances of death due to the same within a month. Extrapleural pneumonectomy is therefore normally performed onyounger patients who are in good health and are in aposition to tolerate the surgery. Palliative Procedures Palliative procedures are normally performed when the canceris in its advanced form. These procedures are performed tocontrol the symptoms of rather than cure them.Pleurectomy (also decortications) is the process tosurgically remove the pleura. This method reduces the paincaused by the cancerous mass and may also prevent therecurrence of pleural effusion (fluid collection whichcauses tremendous breathlessness). For patients sufferingfrom peritoneal mesothelioma, complete surgical removal ofthe entire tumor is not entirely possible. In this case thesurgery aims to extenuate the symptoms, such as ascites, Chemotherapy Chemotherapy is the method in which drugs are used to treatmesothelioma. It has been observed that this method ispartially succesfull. This is because the patient recoverspartially after using drugs or combination of drugs (In factthe efficacy of this method increases, if combination
ofdrugs are used at the same time.) Some of these combinationshave proved successful and new drugs are being developed forthe treatment of this cancer. Radiation Therapy In this method the tumor is killed by using radiation doses.However, with the help of this procedure, killing the tumorcells is quite difficult. This is because of the fact thatit is difficult to specifically locate the malignant cells.Also the heart, lungs and other organs may surround thesame, and they are at the risk of getting damaged by theradiation dosage. However lower doses of radiation can beused to reduce the disease to a certain extent. Dual Therapy Both chemotherapy and radiation are used in conjunctionafter the performance of the surgery. They both help inkilling any remaining tumor cells that were not removed bysurgery and may also help in relieving symptoms of thedisease like chest pain. The treatment methods, which are described above, are directways of treating a person suffering from mesothelioma.However doctors and researchers are always on the lookoutfor new ways to treat mesothelioma. The necessity for theevolution of alternative ways to treat patients sufferingfrom arises because of the complex nature ofdifferent types of cancers, and because patients responddifferently to various types of medical care. Some of them are as follows: Immunoagumentive Therapy (IAT) The goal of IAT is to strengthen the body's own immunesystem. The same is done by balancing four differentproteins found in the blood. Intraoperative Photodynamic Therapy (IPT) This method of treatment is being used to cure early stagesof in the chest. IPT uses special drugs andlight to kill cancer cells during surgery. A drug that makestumor cells more sensitive to light is injected into a veinseveral days before surgery. During surgery, a special lightis used to locate the cancer. Gene Therapy This is a unique method whereby the researchers either tryto improve the body's natural ability to fight against thediseases or alternatively make the cancer cells moresensitive to other kinds of therapy. Did you know mesothelioma clinical symptoms are hard to detect? Find out why by visiting http://www.mesothelioma-a.com
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