Cancer is the Big C! Scary for any one, and why not? Even with the greatest of medical advances we’ve not been able to find a cure for it any where. And the different varieties are enough to confuse any one! It’s exactly for this reason that a diagnosis of cancer can turn a frown man into child; weeping in fear and pancreatic cancer is one of the worst varieties around. According to the National Cancer Institute the cases of pancreatic cancer have tallied at about new cases: 37,680 and deaths at about 34,290 in the US alone in the year 2008.
Risk factors for the disease are not really known but a few familiar culprits are smoking, alcohol, long standing diabetes, chronic pancreatitis and a few hereditary conditions like hereditary pancreatitis, familial atypical multiple mole melanoma syndrome (FAMMM), multiple endocrine neoplasia type 1 syndrome, von Hippel-Lindau syndrome, hereditary nonpolyposis colon cancer (HNPCC; Lynch syndrome), and ataxia-telangiectasia.
The main reason why pancreatic cancer is so scary is because of its speed in spreading. Pancreatic cancer has no symptoms in the early stages and then it spreads so rapidly that diagnosis and treatment becomes absolutely redundant. But I don’t want to be the eternal pessimist and here’s what I’ve learned about the signs and symptoms of pancreatic cancer
• Upper abdominal pain which will spread all over the abdomen but it’s not specific and can mimic indigestion.
• Yellowing of skin and of the eyes causing jaundice due to malfunctioning of the pancreas.
• Sudden loss of weight and depression, fever.
• Bloating and body pains
The symptoms of pancreatic cancer not very specific and can be easily confused for simple common conditions. As a result a large number of affected patients do not understand the symptoms of the disease and land up with a more advanced stage of disease which is much more difficult to treat.
The best way to get yourself checked for pancreatic cancer is if you are a part of the risk factors then you have to get yourself checked for cancer immediately at your doctor. Get a complete physical done and during the physical examination if the doctor can feel a hard mass in the abdomen then its time to go in for more invasive tests like and X-Ray. Further tests you can use are abdominal ultrasounds and abdominal CT scans for a better picture and a better diagnosis. Some doctors will recommend a per-cutaneous biopsy and an endoscope biopsy for diagnosis and grading and staging.
Treatment for every type of cancer is surgery, radiation and chemotherapy. But the prognosis for every type of cancer is dependent on how far the caner has spread at the time of diagnosis and only 15-20% of the patients are able to get their cancer diagnosed so early. Despite recent advances with every type of cancer, the prognosis for pancreatic cancer is really poor and everything depends on the five year mark for recurrence.