Pancreatic cancer is one of the most difficult types of cancer to treat, because it is often detected at a late stage.
Professor Valery Yegiyev, a medical and surgical oncologist, explains what difficulties oncologists face when diagnosing this type of cancer and how modern medicine fights this dangerous disease.
He says: "Pancreatic cancer is one of the 10 most common types of cancer that is difficult to treat. This cancer affects more than 400,000 people in the world annually."
According to him, unfortunately, it is difficult for oncologists to diagnose the disease in the early stages due to its asymptomatic development. In many cases, experienced oncologists even confuse pancreatic cancer with other diseases, such as diabetes or gallstones.
He says: “The main problem is that the person feels healthy, and nothing bothers him at all, but during this time a malignant tumor develops in the pancreas. This tumor develops rapidly and can be fatal.”
The professor points out that symptoms of pancreatic cancer appear in the late stages, in the form of nausea, pain in the right hypochondrium, yellowing of the whites of the eyes and skin (obstructive jaundice), in addition to an enlarged spleen, and weight loss. Dark urine and light-colored stool.
According to him, the most useful methods for diagnosing pancreatic cancer today are endoscopic ultrasound, tumor markers CA 19-9, carcinoembryonic antigen, CT with vascular contrast, and magnetic resonance imaging.
The doctor adds that diagnosing pancreatic cancer at an early stage allows it to be treated surgically. But sometimes, even in advanced stages, this treatment is possible, depending on the affected part of the pancreas.
He points out that to increase the effectiveness of surgical treatment, a combination of chemotherapy and radiotherapy is used, which the patient undergoes before and after surgery. In some cases, neoadjuvant therapy is also used, which involves the use of special chemotherapy drugs before surgery to reduce the size of the tumor.
It is quite unpleasant.
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