Our GP is ready to help you if you want to be sure that you are healthy and in good shape, you have medical questions or problems and want to discuss with an experienced doctor, you have some unknown symptoms and want to know what they could be related to, you want to know another medical opinion about the best way of treatment of your disease.
Cancer is treated by surgery, chemotherapy, radiation, or a combination of these methods. Diagnoses and treatment have become increasingly individualized in recent years. Early detection and the precise staging of therapies have contributed to higher success rates in the battle against cancer.
Many cancers that only recently had poor prognoses are now considered curable. Potentially curable cancers now include acute lymphocytic leukemia in children, Burkitt's lymphoma, Ewing 's sarcoma (a form of bone cancer), Wilm's tumor (a kidney cancer in children), Hodgkin's disease, rhabdomyosarcoma (a cancer of certain muscle tissues), testicular cancer, choriocarcinoma (placental cancer), osteogenic sarcoma, and breast cancer.
Current developments also show the promise of improved treatment for many other forms of cancer. For example, the recently discovered importance of oncogenes--the genes in a tumor cell that are associated with the transformation of normal cells into cancerous ones--promises to help predict which tumors are likely to return after surgery. This knowledge can also help identify family members who are at risk.
It has also been found that cancer cells fused genetically with normal cells produce special antibodies that seek out cancer cells. These monoclonal antibodies are being studied for their potential use in diagnosis and treatment.
There are many other advances, including:
Adjuvant treatment in which drugs are administered postoperatively in early breast and colon cancers to eradicate remaining cancer cells and thus increase cure rates
Neoadjuvant chemotherapy in which drugs are given to shrink the cancer before surgery
Synthetic retinoids (cousins of vitamin A) to prevent cancer in high-risk groups or the recurrence of cancer after surgery
Removal and replacement of sections of bone in bone cancer instead of amputation of entire limbs
New high-tech diagnostic imaging techniques (magnetic resonance imaging [MRI] and computerized tomography [CT] scans) instead of exploratory surgery in some cases
Immunotherapy to enhance the body's disease-fighting capabilities (naturally occurring bodily substances, such as interferon, interleukin-2, and biologic response modifiers, are all in trials for this purpose)
Bone marrow transplants for the treatment of leukemia
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