If you have recently been diagnosed with cancer, you might be incredibly worried about the types of treatments that are used to help cancer. However, not every cancer is treated in the same way, and each individual’s case might be different. Then, here are some of the most common types of cancer treatment that you should be prepared for.
Chemotherapy
Chemotherapy kills the cancerous cells in your body and prevents them from growing or expanding further. However, many different drugs are used in chemotherapy, and each has different side effects.
Some of the most common side effects of chemotherapy include hair loss, nausea and sickness, a weakened immune system, and mouth ulcers. You might also experience dry skin, and some chemotherapies can leave you with permanent damage to your kidneys and heart.
The survival rate for chemotherapy in patients is often higher than those who do not have chemotherapy though, and survival rates are high for a lot of cancers when they are caught at stage 1 or 2, or when the cancer is localized.
Radiotherapy
You might also have radiotherapy if you have cancer. Radiotherapy can only be used on each part of your body once and works by using radiation to eradicate cancerous cells in the body. Radiotherapy is usually localized, which means that it is given to those whose cancer has been caught in the early stages, rather than those whose cancer has spread around the body.
This means that it is vital that you know the signs of each cancer, and what to look out for, as well as whether you are at risk. To find out about the symptoms of throat cancer, among others, you should consider heading to moffitt.org.
Not only this, but radiotherapy can also be used to prevent your cancer from returning, and so can be used in conjunction with other treatments such as chemotherapy.
Transplants
As a cancer patient, you might also be on the receiving end of a transplant. This is especially the case if you have leukemia or lymphoma, which can damage your blood cells and affect your white blood cells and bone marrow.
If you have this type of cancer, you might find that you get a bone marrow transplant which can help to replenish your body with healthy blood cells, particularly if your bone marrow cannot create the blood cells that are needed anymore. You might also receive chemotherapy and radiotherapy before this.
Surgery
You should also prepare yourself for the possibility of surgery. Often, your consultant may suggest removing the tumor from your body as much as possible if it is in an easily accessible place and if it is not attached to an organ.
However, your cancer might have to decrease in size before this is possible, and so you might have to have other forms of treatment to prepare for this surgery. Surgery can have a long recovery time, but it can sometimes be the best way of removing the cancer and getting it out of your body as quickly as possible.
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