Saturday 3 September 2011

Mesothelioma treatment methods

There are several methods of treatment for mesothelioma although none of these have a high success rate. In general, the chances of curing a mesothelioma patient depends on how much the cancer has developed and matured when treated. If tackled aggressively in its early stages, there is a good chance...

                       There are several methods of treatment for mesothelioma although none of these have a high success rate. In general, the chances of curing a mesothelioma patient depends on how much the cancer has developed and matured when treated. If tackled aggressively in its early stages, there is a nice chance of survival. Due to the difficulty of diagnosing mesothelioma in its early stages, plenty of mesothelioma treatments focus on improving the quality of life for patients.

                     Before a patient is treated on, a doctor will pick what the best work of treatment is by thinking about the patient's age, medical history, general well being and even weight. From here, the doctor will pick which of the two most common treatments are most suited to the patient's condition. These treatments are surgical procedure, chemotherapy and radiation therapy.

Surgical procedure

Surgical procedure comes in six different types. Aggressive surgical procedure is treatment which aims to gain long term control against the cancer and palliative procedures which aims to relieve the patient of signs.

                            Aggressive surgical procedure involves removing the pleura, the lung, the diaphragm and the pericardium. This procedure is named additional pleural pneumonectomy. The aim of this is to remove as much of the tumour as feasible without harming the patient. However, this is a dicy type of surgical procedure and the chances are high of patient fatality within a month. Due to this, only young, fit individuals are referred to this sort of treatment. Palliative procedures involve removing the pleura in order to control the signs of the cancer. This is performed when mesothelioma is in an advanced form and is impossible to cure.

Chemotherapy

This is the most often known cure of cancer. Chemotherapy makes use of drugs to treat mesothelioma although plenty of of these drugs have a poor success rate on patients. Combinations of drugs are often used to improve their effect. Some of these combinations have proved to be effective. Chemotherapy of mesothelioma is being improved regularly as research labs and pharmaceutical companies are discovering new and more effective drugs.

Radiation Therapy

Radiation therapy makes use of radiation to kill the tumour which mesothelioma creates. However, this procedure is difficult because of where the tumour grows. Due to the closeness of the tumour and plenty of vital internal organs such as the heart and lungs, doctors must be cautious as to the doses of radiation they use. Lower radiation doses can be used however this lowers its effectiveness.

Dual Therapy

This is often used and is a combination of surgical procedure, chemotherapy and radiation therapy combined. Surgical procedure removes all of the tumour cells while chemotherapy and radiation therapy work on removing the remainder. This is an effective process and also diminishes the signs of the cancer.

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