Treatment of esophageal cancer — popular methods

Treatment of esophageal cancer will be more successful if you start it in the early stages of the disease. Unfortunately, this is not always possible, as the inattention of the patient to itself, together with the cunning of oncological diseases often do not allow time to diagnosis. However, in most cases, esophageal cancer develops slowly, so the prognosis is more positive than if the cancer lose some other organs. For example, the survival rate for esophageal cancer stage 1 50-80%. Although the treatment in 2 stages, the figure drops to 30%.

Treatments

Treatment in this case, as in most other cancer diseases is carried out in three main ways:

• Chemotherapy
• Radiation therapy
• Surgical treatment.

Despite the development of medicine and what opportunities to help cancer patients today are much more, still a significant number of patients are turning to traditional medicine. In General, the treatment of esophageal cancer folk remedies includes herbal medicine. For example, the known antitumor effect of this plant as celandine. But do not forget about the toxic effect of the plants, and the statistics are inexorable: without medical help, patients with esophageal cancer die much faster. Therefore, people's money can be only part of treatment, unless they are approved by the doctor.

Treatment of esophageal cancer is more successful when using a combination of methods. They complement each other. If you use only surgical treatment, the life expectancy of patients is significantly lower than the combination of surgery with chemotherapy and radiotherapy.

The main goal of treatment improving the quality of life of the patient. In 75% of cases of this disease there is a disorder of swallowing (dysphagia), i.e. patients can with difficulty feed himself, and even the process of swallowing food becomes impossible. Therefore, one of the main results of treatment is the restoration of swallowing.

The choice of treatment

The choice of method depends on how widespread the tumor is and where it is located. If the tumor is in the lower third of the thoracic or abdominal part of the esophagus surgical treatment. Tumor localization in the middle third of the thoracic involves complex surgical and radiation treatment. With the defeat the upper part of the esophagus in many cases, you can only do radiation therapy. Radiation therapy reduces the activity of the tumor, reduces its size.

The methods of exposure:

• Remote (through the skin).
• Contact (brachytherapy a radiation source is placed in the lumen of the esophagus and acts directly on the tumor).
• Combined (both methods are applied for radiation therapy).

Chemotherapy for esophageal cancer

This method of treatment as independent used infrequently, as in this case, the effect is minimal. Good results are obtained by combination chemotherapy with surgery or radiation therapy. Although in cases where an impossible surgery and radiation therapy, chemotherapy remains the only possible method of treatment. Today found new drugs that can improve the condition of patients and prolong their life. For example, good results have shown cytokine therapy.

Surgical treatment of esophageal cancer

Surgery for cancer of the esophagus remains the primary treatment of this disease. In most cases, only timely surgery is a chance on getting rid of the tumor or to extend the life with some quality.

The types of surgical treatment

• Resection of the esophagus,
• Extirpation of the esophagus
• Recanalization of the lumen of the esophagus,
• Stenting of the esophagus.

Resection of the esophagus textbook operation, which removes thethe affected part of the esophagus with the tumor. To restore integrity, made of plastic, which means the replacement of a lost part of the esophagus. Most often this is done with a segment of the large intestine, or tube, is cut from part of the stomach. Extirpation of the esophagus is its complete removal with replacement of the entire body.

Both these operations are quite large and require a long rehabilitation period. However, in cases of extensive lesions is possible only these options. Especially they are shown in the formation of metastases in adjacent organs and lymph nodes. Removal of regional lymph nodes is one of the principles of modern Oncology. Implementation in practice this procedure significantly improved the results of their operations and survival.

Recanalization is a modern minimal invasive operation performed with a laser. It is the evaporation of part of the tumor and the restoration of the lumen of the esophagus.

Stenting of the esophagus (introduction into the body of the metal frame) allows to prevent the development of dysphagia.

In severe cases, palliative treatment is performed. It can be as drug therapy and surgery. In any case, all actions are aimed not to fight the tumor and to maintain the patient's life and relief of symptoms.