Radiation Therapy Do Little to Help Mesothelioma Patients, but Photodynamic Therapy May Be a Hope
Oncologists determine what type of treatment to prescribe to each patient. There are numerous options. There are no standard treatment regimen for asbestos cancer patients. Mesotheliomas lack of agreed-upon treatment is due to low a treatment success rate, rareness, a high mortality rate and a small number of studies providing meaningful stats.
While prospects for patients with mesothelioma have been bleak, doctors have been making progress. Customary treatments for cancer are surgery (removing the tumor and the tissue that surrounds it), radiation (killing the cancerous cells with radiation), and chemotherapy (poisoning the cancerous cells.) Each one of these methods have problems. Traditional radiation therapy has not worked well with mesothelioma patients. Researchers are looking for ways of aiming radiation directly at the tumor in hopes that this will result in less damage to healthy tissue.
Surgery takes out the mesothelial cancerous tissue around the tumor. The surgery is difficult and challenging, with unknown effects or benefits to patients. Most chemotherapy medication that work on other cancers typically do not work on mesothelioma, and different mixtures of these drugs have not been successful. Like radiation, researchers are focusing their work on controlling the physical location of the treatment with an emphasis on the pleural cavity.
Many advanced techniques in cancer treatment are tried on mesothelioma patients because of its high fatality rate. Such treatments include anti-angiogenesis drugs like thalidomide and biologic therapies agent interleukin 2. The new drug pemetrexed (brand name Alimta) has shown good results in extending life with mesotheliomas..
Considered by oncologists is where the tumor is located, what stage the mesothelioma is in, and the age and health of the patient. Theres also photodynamic therapy and gene therapy ” two far-out new ways of attacking cancer. Clinical trials using these techniques are being offered to some of those who have mesothelioma.
