Lung Cancer In The 20th Century: A Summary

(Transition: we have discussed the causes, lets look at the risk factors including some environmental ones.)

What are lung cancers? Lung cancers are the abnormal cells which grow in uncontrolled manner in one or both lungs. They do not function as normal lung cells and do not develop into healthy lung tissue. The abnormal cells can grow, form tumours and interfere with the normal functions of the lung (Lungcancer.org, 2015). Lung cancers can be divided into two major types, namely non-small cell lung cancers (NSCLC) and small cell lung cancers (SCLC). NSCLC can be further classified into three main subtypes, namely adenocarcinoma, squamous-cell carcinoma and large-cell carcinoma (Longo & Harrison, 2012). Lung cancers can be diagnosed by chest X-ray, computerised tomography (CT) scan, positron emission tomography-computerised tomography (PET-CT) scan, bronchoscopy and biopsy (Nhs.uk, 2015). Unfortunately, lung cancers are often diagnosed at the later stages. This is due to the unrecognisable symptoms and warning signs at the earlier stages. NSCLC are often diagnosed at stage IV which accounts for 30-40% of cases whereas 60% of SCLC is diagnosed at stage IV. Lung cancer usually originates from the cells lining the bronchi, bronchioles and alveoli. Carcinogens especially tobacco smoke will alter the gene expression of the normal human lung cells, resulting in cell mutation. The proto-oncogenes will be converted to mutated form, oncogenes. Mutation leads to the decreased expression of the tumour suppressor genes. This results in uncontrolled cell proliferation, cell

The human body is designed so that each part is dependent on the other for one or the other reason. There is a delicate balance to the distribution of functions and the way in which each system defenses itself against any unmentionable disease or ailment.

Throughout life, many individuals experience difficulties due to growing up in everyday life. While going in depth of the human life, it is discovered that there are many diseases and disorders that affect humans’ everyday functions. A very popular disease that has traumatically affected the human body is cancer. Cancer is a disease that spreads throughout your body in many ways. The purpose of cancer is to attach to a blood cell in your body and cause a plague within itself, causing the body to initially shut down and die. This disease contains many forms and have many causes to it. However its main goal is to destroy the human body.

The leading cause of cancer death for both men and women in the United States and worldwide is lung cancer. Lung cancer is responsible for thirty percent of cancer deaths in the United States. The deaths caused by breast cancer, colon cancer and prostate cancer combined do not add up to the deaths that lung cancer causes. In 2007, 158,683 people, 88,243 men and 70,354 women died from lung cancer in the United States (Eldridge, 2012). Out of the 158,683 people that died from lung cancer in 2007, 135,000 of them died of lung cancer caused by smoking cigarettes. The overall survival rate of those with lung cancer is at about fifteen percent.

Lung cancer is a genetic and acquired disease. Lung cancer is genetic because cancer in general is caused by changes to the genes that control the way our cells function, especially how they grow and divide. All of these changes include mutations in the DNA that makes up our genes. Genetic changes that increase cancer risk can be inherited from our parents, if the changes are presents in germ cells. Which are the reproductive cells of the body, those are the eggs and the sperm. Lung cancer is also acquired because as the result of errors that occur as cells divide a person’s lifetime or exposure to certain chemicals. Some examples of these chemicals are found in tobacco smoke, radiation, UV rays from the sun that damage DNA. “In general, cancer cells have more genetic changes than normal cells. But each person’s cancer has a unique combination of genetic alterations.” Some of these changes may be the result of cancer, rather than the cause. As the cancer continues to grow, additional changes will occur. Even within the same tumor, cancer cells may have different genetic changes.

Lung cancer is a tumor that affects either one or both of the lungs.A primary cancer begins in the lungs and a secondary cancer begins in another place in the body and makes its way up towards the lungs. Lung cancer is the 5th most common cancer. In Australia 59% of males were diagnosed were as 41% of Australian females were diagnosed.

This paper discusses in distinct detail the pathology of lung cancer, specifically malignant tumors. This investigation into the cancer touches on many different subjects that include: the history of the disease and how it came to be so prevalent, it’s cellular origins, how it is diagnosed within a patient, the different treatments used to fight it, and the survival rates for people with any sort of lung cancer. The paper also goes in depth about the use of x-rays and how they are used to find lung cancer. There are many resources used for this paper and they are cited as necessary.

When I was 14 I was staying in a double room in Memorial with another girl. She was 16 and had lung cancer, which at this point was quickly spreading to the rest of her body with the doctors at a loss on how to stop it. Her name was Melissa and we very quickly became friends. She was checked in about 3 weeks before I arrived, and it certainly didn’t seem like she was leaving anytime soon, despite how badly she protested that how she was living wasn’t actually living. We didn’t really talk much the first couple of days I was there but on the fifth day she asked me the most asked question among patients in hospital, “So what are you in here for?”

I remember it was a December evening, when my parents and I had just gotten back from the Nutcracker Ballet when they called to tell us that my Grandma had passed away in her sleep. My Grandma had been staying in California with my Aunt Cindy for over six or seven months, and she had been staying in a hospital bed since soon after she got to California because she was very ill with lung cancer. It made me feel very sad to think about her dying.

Anyone can develop lung cancer. However, there are some people who are at a greater risk for it than others. There are some lung cancer risk factors that you can control, but there are other factors that cannot be controlled. Below is a list of some of the possible lung cancer risk factors:

When we are young, we never think about anything bad happening. We always imagine our parents living forever and taking care of us. We didn’t understand why everyone was sad at a funeral. We didn’t react like adults do when something bad happens. Children aren’t programmed to think the worst of things normally. They’re lucky. When a certain age comes along, reality really slaps you in the face and everything kind of crumbles down. The tragedies of life really make it hard to remember when things were simpler.

Introduction: Lung cancers are well known to display inter and intra-tumoral heterogeneity with profound implications for exact histological classification by pathologists1–3. The New International (IASLC/ATS/ERS )4,5 and the 2015 World Health Organization (WHO) classification6 has defined the non-invasive (adenocarcinoma in situ), minimally invasive adenocarcinoma and invasive lepidic adenocarcinoma ; has replaced the 'mixed subtype category ' in the WHO 2004 classification7 with the predominant subtype ; included the micropapillary subtype8,9 and replaced the term “mucinous bronchioloalveolar carcinoma(BAC)” with invasive mucinous adenocarcinoma. This study aimed to do a comprehensive histological subtyping and detailed study of

This study was done on 81 patients (73 males and 8 females) with primary lung cancer. Their ages ranging from 19 to 85 with mean age was 61.605 years old (±12.319 SD) as shown in table (1). Out of the 81 patients; 66 patients were smokers and ex smokers while 15 patients were non smokers as shown in table (2).

Lung cancer is on of the leading causes of death today. Lung cancer is a type of neoplasm cancer and is given its name but the site of where the cancer is located. Gale Encyclopedia of Medicine states, “ Most lung cancers develop in the cells that line the bronchi.” Lung cancer can take many years to develop and some have no idea that they even have it until it grows large enough to impede the function of the lungs. There are two different types of tumors the benign, which means that it does not spread and stops growing or the malignant where they grow and spread. The etiology of lung cancer comes from the neoplasm which means that has come about from new abnormal cell growth. Most types of neoplasms are solid masses that form but can