The Menace of Cancer Essay

Cancer is one of the leading causes of natural death in the world. The disease is characterized by uncontrolled growth of abnormal cells in various or all parts of the body. Governments and professional doctors have formulated a staging system to facilitate the diagnosis of cancer. After diagnosis, an individual has to undergo through various treatments either surgery, chemotherapy, or radiotherapy. The paper focuses on the diagnosis and the staging of cancer, complications of the disease, side effects of the various treatments, and recommendations to mitigate the physical and physiological effects of the treatment interventions.

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Individuals with cancer symptoms first visit a primary care provider before the definite diagnosis is conducted. A significant number of individuals are diagnosed with cancer through physical examination and history taking when undergoing treatment of other unrelated diseases. Some of the diagnostic methods used to determine cancer include morphological methods, sampling methods, molecular techniques, specimen preparation, biomarkers, and imaging diagnosis (Emole, 2012). The morphological method involves the process of collecting raw data from the patient such as age, gender, duration of the disease, location and size of the lesion, prior treatment, and collection of the tissue sample. Sampling methods include incisional biopsy, which involves removal of a part of the tumor for laboratory analysis. Other sampling methods that are used in the diagnosis of cancer include excisional biopsy, needle aspiration, cytology, and endoscopic procedures (Emole, 2012). Collection of the tissue specimen and molecular techniques such as FISH, DNA microarray analysis, immunocytochemistry, flow cytometry, and electron microscopy are some of the diagnostic methods utilized by pathologists to detect cancer. Imaging is the last diagnosis that is used to diagnose the symptoms of cancer.

The next step toward cancer treatment is staging. Staging is the system that classifies the extent of cancer and helps the doctor to determine the best treatment for the patient. Staging is conducted during the time of diagnosis. The American Joint Committee on Cancer and the International Union for Cancer Control have developed the tumor node metastasis (TNM) system, which is the widely used program for cancer staging among clinicians (Edge & Compton, 2010). The system records the extent of the tumor, the regional lymph nodes, distant metastases, and offers a stage grouping based on T, N, and M. the TNM system is useful in staging a majority of cancers such as breast, esophagus, lung, stomach, pancreas, colon, and rectal cancer types.

The worldwide incidence of cancer has led to more complications among patients with cancer. The issues can either be direct or structural such as mechanical compression of structures adjacent to the tumor; indirect complications such as immune suppression, paraneoplastic syndrome, and hypercoagulability; and, surgical complications due to chemotherapy and radiotherapy (Guimaraes, Bitencourt, Marchiori, Chojniak, & Gross, 2014). Acute oncological complications are common among cancer patients and they include spinal cord compression syndrome, intracranial hypertension, superior vena cava syndrome, pleural effusion, pericardial effusion with cardiac tamponade, intestinal obstruction, inflammatory intestinal changes, bleeding complications, biliary complications, and urinary tract obstruction (Guimaraes et al., 2014).

The detected cancer complications are treated through chemotherapy and radiotherapy. Both treatments are valid, but they are followed by side effects that affect the health of the patient even after surviving cancer. Demirci, Benekli, Buyukberber, and Coskum (2010) define late side effects as the impacts that appear after the completion of treatment. The late side effects from cancer treatment range from cardiovascular, pulmonary, endocrine, neuropsychiatric, Genitourinary, Gastrointestinal, visual and audio, Musculoskeletal, and secondary cancers (Demirci et al., 2010). Cardiovascular side effects compose those that affect the heart and the blood vessels. Cardiovascular side effects include cardiomyopathy, arrhythmias, and coronary artery disease. Additionally, pulmonary side effects are prevalent among younger patients, and they affect the thoracic wall and the pulmonary capacity. Radiotherapy is the primary cause of pulmonary side effects. Older patients have a high chance of being diagnosed with endocrine side effects. These individuals suffer from growth hormone deficiency. Neuropsychiatric effects are common among patients who underwent cranial radiation therapy. Attention deficiency, mental retardation, and peripheral neuropathy are evident. Besides, genitourinary side effects include rectal toxicity, hypomagnesemia, and renal tubular acidosis. Chronic liver damage arises due to the gastrointestinal impacts. Visual and auditory effects cause orbital hypoplasia and decrease in lacrimation. Trabecular bone loss occurs due to the musculoskeletal impacts. Lastly, chemotherapy and radiotherapy cause secondary cancers to develop in later years.

Conclusion

The physical and psychological side effects that arise from surgery, chemotherapy, and radiation can be mitigated using various interventions. Technological advancements have made it possible for medical devices to be used as an alternative for treatment method such as radiation (Kalin, 2012). Radiation seeds, balloon catheters, nanoparticles, carbon tubes, and MEMS are some of the medical devices that can be utilized to treat cancer and minimize the occurrence of late side effects (Kalin, 2012). Clinicians believe that these medical devices are essential to improving treatment delivery in cancer patients because cells surrounding the tumor are left unharmed. Equally important, the oxidative stress produced during chemotherapy and radiotherapy causes side effects such as hair loss, nausea, and cardiotoxicity. Nepomuceno (2011) identified that these physical and psychological effects could be mitigated through the intake of antioxidant vitamins such as A, C and E, selenium, and flavonoids. These antioxidants play various roles ranging from detoxification of the Reactive oxygen species (ROS) to acting as free radical chain breaker during lipid peroxidation. The roles played by the vitamins ensure the physical and psychological effects of cancer treatment are minimized to improve the quality of life of the patient. It is advisable for the cancer patients to consume dietary antioxidants to mitigate treatment effects.

References

Demirci, U., Benekli, M., Buyukberber, S., & Coskun, U. (2010). Late side effects of cancer therapy. International Journal of Hematology and Oncology, 27(4), pp.250-261.

Edge, S. B., & Compton, C. C. (2010). The American Joint Committee on Cancer: the 7th edition of the AJCC cancer staging manual and the future of TNM. Annals of surgical oncology, 17(6), pp.1471-1474.

Emole, J. (2012). Cancer diagnosis and treatment: an overview for the general practitioner. In Primary Care at a Glance-Hot Topics and New Insights. InTech.

Guimaraes, M. D., Bitencourt, A. G., Marchiori, E., Chojniak, R., Gross, J. L., & Kundra, V. (2014). Imaging acute complications in cancer patients: what should be evaluated in the emergency setting?. Cancer Imaging, 14(1), pp.1-12.

Kalin, A. (2012). Diminishing the side effects of cancer treatment by improving treatment delivery (Master's thesis). Columbia University.

Nepomuceno, J. C. (2011). Antioxidants in cancer treatment. In Current Cancer Treatment-Novel Beyond Conventional Approaches. InTech.