Cancer treatments is highly variable and depends on a number of factors including the type, location and amount of cancer as well as in the patient’s physical status. The treatment is designed to kill or remove cancer cells directly or to take them to their death through deprivation signals required for cell division or to stimulate their own defenses.
Treatments can be divided into categories based on their order and mode of action. The different types of treatment are constantly used in combination, either simultaneously or sequentially. The following sections describe some of the most common treatments for cancer. The types of treatments used and the order in which they are used are decisions made by the physician and patient.
The types of treatment and its objectives are described briefly below and in detail in the sections listed above.
- Surgery is often the first treatment for various solid tumors. In cases where the cancer is detected early, surgery may be sufficient to cure the patient by removing all the cancer cells. Benign tumors can also be removed by surgery.
- Radiation therapy : It can be used in conjunction with surgery and / or drug treatments. The goal of radiation to kill cancer cells directly by damaging them with high energy beams.
- Chemotherapy: A term used for a wide variety of drugs used to kill cancer cells. Chemotherapy drugs work by damaging cancer cells that keep dividing and preventing their reproduction.
- Specific inhibitors: This class of drugs is relatively new in the treatment of cancer. They work by targeting specific proteins and processes that are almost always limited to cancer cells. Inhibition of these processes prevents the growth and division of cancer cells.
- Antibodies: This treatment involves the use of antibodies to fight cancer cells. While antibodies are proteins that occur naturally in our bodies, the antibodies used in cancer treatment have been manufactured for use as drugs. These antibodies may work through several different mechanisms, either depriving cancer cells of necessary signals or direct death. Because of their specificity, antibodies may be considered as a kind of specific inhibitors.
- Biological Response Modifiers: These treatments use normal proteins that occur naturally in our bodies to stimulate own defenses against cancer.
- Vaccines: The purpose of cancer vaccines is to stimulate our body’s defenses. Vaccines usually contain proteins that are or are produced by cancer cells. In administering these proteins, treatment focuses on increasing the immune response of our bodies against cancer cells.
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