Pancreatic Cancer Research Paper

According to Professor John Neoptolemos, "There are approximately 7,000 new cases each year - but it is one of the most lethal cancers." The main reason for the low survival rate from pancreatic cancer is due to its difficulty in finding this cancer early. By the time a person has symptoms, the cancer has often reached a large size and spread to other organs. Because the pancreas is deep inside the body, the doctor cannot see or feel tumors during a routine physical exam. There are currently no blood tests or other tests that can easily find this cancer early in people without symptoms. Tests for certain genes in people with a family history of the disease can help tell if they are at higher risk for cancer. There are some new tests for finding pancreatic cancer early in people with a strong family history of the disease, but these tests are complicated and expensive. Some symptoms of pancreatic cancer include jaundice, a yellow color of the eyes and skin caused by a substance buildup in the liver, pain in the belly area or in the middle of the back, significant weight loss over a number of months, loss of appetite, digestive problems including nausea, vomiting, pain that tends to be worse after eating, a swollen gallbladder that is enlarged, blood clots that form in the veins or cause problems with fatty tissue under the skin, and diabetes. If the doctor has any reason to suspect pancreatic cancer, certain tests will be done to see if the disease is really

When spreading through the body there are certain stages the cancer has to go through to expand. Stage 0. There is no spread.The cancer is limited to only one cell in the pancreas. Stage I: The cancer is only limited to the pancreas cell, but has moved at least two centimeters. Not yet visible in screening tests. Stage II: The cancer has grown outside the pancreas and may have spread to the lymph nodes. Stage III: The tumor has spread drastically making it now possible for the tests to detect the tumor,increasing the possibility for it expand into the blood vessels or nerves. Stage IV: The cancer has spread to different organs of the body.("Pancreatic Cancer Treatments by Stage") The first place to attack after spreading would be the stomach, then it would expand to the liver. After the cancer reaches these points, it travels to other places in the body. ("Treating Pancreatic Cancer, Based on Extent of the Cancer").

Pancreatic Cancer is cancer of an organ in the human body called the pancreas, which is located behind the lower part of the stomach. The function of this organ is to secrete certain essential enzymes to digest food and also secrete hormones to metabolize sugars such as insulin and glucagon (Mayoclinic). People get pancreatic cancer when the cells of the pancreas develop genetic mutations; and these can form in both the exocrine and endocrine cells of the pancreas, but exocrine tumors are more common than endocrine tumors. Because this cancer spreads very quickly throughout the body and the symptoms of the disease don’t usually appear until the cancer is at an advanced stage, it is a leading cause of death

The risk factors of pancreatic cancer are habits that most Americans have developed and can not seem to break. There are five major risk factors that people should consider which include the following; Genetics, Diabetes, Smoking, Obesity and Diet (Wax, 2012). Pancreatic cancer runs in five to ten percent of people who have immediate family members who have also had it (Wax, 2012). Different genes have been indicated as risk but no “pancreatic cancer gene” has yet been discovered (Wax, 2012). “People with diabetes develop Pancreatic cancer about twice as often then people without it” (Margolis, 2002, p.497) and the two diseases have been linked (Wax, 2012). Tobacco use is known to increase the risk of pancreatic cancer (Cancer Research UK, 2013). Smoking will double the risk in developing the disease (Wax, 2012). People, who quit smoking, can reduce the risk of pancreatic, lung, mouth, and certain other cancers and diseases. It is a known fact that people with a body mass index ( BMI) higher

Pancreatic Cancer is the leading cause of cancer deaths in the United States. Currently there is no cure for this cancer and all available treatments simply prolong the life of the patient. Diagnosing pancreatic cancer rarely occurs at the onset of the disease due to the location of the pancreas in the body. Symptoms such as weight loss and upper abdominal pain do not show up until it is too late. Enzymes produced by tumors known as tumor markers are not reliable until the disease has well progressed. Once you have been diagnosed with Pancreatic Cancer there are different types of treatments that are offered to prolong your life.

Table 1: Causes of Pancreatic Cancer What are the symptoms of pancreatic cancer? The symptoms are wide ranged but usually do not appear till in the late stages of the cancer. That is one of the reasons that this is such a deadly killer. Some of the more common symptoms are shared by other diseases and is another factor that causes this disease so hard to diagnose. Pain in the upper back or upper abdomen, loss of appetite, weight loss, jaundice (yellowing of the eyes and skin, dark urine), indigestion, nausea and vomiting. This is a list of the more common symptoms but as with each individual the symptoms can be different in each. As with any unknown disease, a physician is the best place to start to protect peopleshealth and get a correct diagnosis. How is pancreatic cancer diagnosed? The physician will order a variety of possible diagnostic tests. A blood test can assess various pancreatic and liver functions and may suggest pancreatic cancer. If cancer is suspected a needle biopsy is usually conducted to examine the pancreas cells themselves for signs of cancer (Britannica Online 2007). These procedures are invasive and can cause complications including pancreatitis. In order to make a correct diagnosis and to determine the stage of the cancer it is possible to use multiple imaging techniques to allow doctors to see the pancreas even though it

The indications of pancreatic adenocarcinoma don't generally show up in the disease's initial stages and are individually not different to the illness. The indications at diagnosis shift as per the area of the tumor in the pancreas, which anatomists divide into the thick head, the neck, and the decreasing body, finishing in the tail. Despite a tumor's area, the most

The causes of cancer are complex. It may be caused by a variety of things, including your genetic make-up and lifestyle choices, such as smoking. But having a risk factor, or even many risk factors, does not mean that one may suffer from the disease. And there are cases, who developed the diseases with few or no known risk factors.Several factors can affect a person’s chance of getting cancer of the pancreas. Most of these are risk factors for exocrine pancreatic cancer.

Cancer has been one of the biggest killers in the world for the past 100 years. Previously, before science advanced to the point that it’s at today; no one really understand where cancer came from or why it would suddenly generate inside a human’s body. But, since finding out the reasons behind all of the hundreds of different cancers, there’s almost always a cause/health defect.

Many diseases had been appearing from a long time. Sometimes, our body fails to make any response against that disease. Pancreatic cancer is a type of cancer that appears in the pancreas, it is generally detected after a period of time and until it becomes hard to treat or remove.

There is only one cause of pancreatic cancer, mutated genes. However, there are various ways that genes may become mutated. Firstly, some people are born with one mutant copy of a

Context: Surgical resection remains the primary and the only potentially-curative treatment for pancreatic carcinoma. However, aggressive multi-visceral surgical option in the presence of locally-advanced disease is controversial.

Pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDA) is an aggressive and difficult malignancy to treat. It is the 4th most common cause of death by cancer in the US. PDA encompasses 85% of all pancreatic cancers with a 5% survival rate five years after diagnosis. It consists of a dense fibrous stroma that is made up of a heterogeneous population of cells including fibroblasts, myofibroblasts, pancreatic stellate cells and immune cells. It is believed that this fibrous network promotes cancer progression and induce resistance to chemotherapy and radiation therapy.

INTRODUCTION Pancreatic cancer is the fourth leading cause of cancer death Worldwide. It is the eighth most common cause of death from cancer in both individuals. Higher incidence is noted as thirteen because of the very poor prognosis. Less than 5% of all patients are still alive only for 5 years after initial diagnosis. It is rarely detected in the early stages and conventional cancer treatment failed due to high resistance to chemotherapy.

This is due to the invasive ability of pancreatic cancer cells during the early stages of carcinogenesis. Therefore, a majority of patients diagnosed with pancreatic cancer often results in death due to metastatic disease, even after treatment, making it very complex and difficult to treat (2).