Information About Cancer

Cancer is a class of diseases in which a group of cells display uncontrolled growth, invasion and sometimes metastasis (meaning that it spreads to other locations in the body via the lymph or the bloodstream.) These three malignant properties of cancer can’t be any more different, take benign tumors which are self limited and don’t invade or metastasize (grow). Most types of cancer form some sort on tumor, but some like leukemia don’t. The most popular and effective type of medicine concerned with the study, diagnosis, treatments and prevention of cancer is oncology.

Oncology is a type of medicine that deals with tumors. (cancer) The medical professional that practices oncology is called an oncologist. This term originates from the Greek word onkos. It means bulk, mass or tumor.

Oncology is most concerned with:

• The diagnosis of any cancers or tumors in a person
• Therapy that any patients might need (e.g., chemotherapy, radiotherapy, surgery and any other modalities if appropriate.
• Follow-up appointments that any patient needs after successful treatment.
• Palliative care for patients with terminal malignancies
• Ethical and informative questions surrounding their illness and the overall cancer care.
• Screening of the patients family members, (in some cases such as breast cancer are thought to be of a hereditary basis it seems appropriate to do so.)

Cancer can affect people of any age and it can even affect fetuses, but the risk for most cancer increases with age. Cancer causes around about 13% of all human deaths. Approximately 7.6 million people alone died form cancer in the world on 2007. Cancer doesn’t only affect us humans it can also affect animals.

Nearly all types of cancers are caused by abnormalities in the genetic material of the transformed cells. Theses abnormalities mostly caused by the effects of cigarettes, tobacco smoke, radiation, dangerous chemicals or infectious agents. Some other are acquired through errors in DNA replication, or in some cases is inherited and are already in all cells from birth. Most cancers only really happen when several genes are damaged in the same cells. This kind of damage accumulates over the many years of our life, and this is why cancer is usually most common in older people. Cancer is very rare in children although quite alot of children and diagnosed with the terrible disease every year.

Cancer cells instrust the body to make them a new blood supply. The tumour or tumours can then grow bigger and bigger until the cancer cells begin to invade the surrounding tissues, then spreading to the other organs using the blood vessels and lymph circulation.