Treatments and Drugs for Cancer

The term chemotherapy is defined as: “The treatment of disease by means of chemicals that have a specific toxic effect upon the disease-producing microorganisms that selectively destroy cancerous tissue” (Dictionary of Cultural Literacy). When chemotherapy was first developed at the beginning

There are many different type of cancers, there are also many different types of treatments. One of the most known types of treatments would be chemotherapy. Chemotherapy can be used for a wide range of different types of cancers and diseases, and each of the different types of cancers or diseases require a different group, and sometimes order, of chemicals to properly treat the cancer or disease. These chemicals include: Alkylating agents, Antimetabolites, Anthracyclines, Topoisomerase inhibitors, mitotic inhibitors, corticosteroids, and more. Each of these drugs previously listed have its own cancer type(s) or disease(s) that it can assist in treating. Some of these cancers include: Leukemia, Lymphoma, Hodgkin disease, multiple

Depending on the time of diagnosis and the particular stage at which the cancer is present in the body, treatment options range from a mastectomy, chemotherapy, or surgery (Haas, 2008). A mastectomy is the surgical removal of the breast, it is an approach often taken to halt the spread of cancer cells to other parts of the body. Chemotherapy is an alternative to a treating the cancer. Chemotherapy for breast cancer is a systemic treatment, which affects most of the cells in your body. Most often chemotherapy is classified as the therapeutic use of chemicals to treat or control a particular disease. Potent drugs are used to kill or hinder the uncontrolled growth of cancer cells by interrupting their DNA, protein production, preventing cell division, starving them of their nutrients or blocking hormone receptors (Stephan, 2010).

The defining goal is to eliminate all evidence of the cancer cells with the use of cytotoxic agents. Chemotherapeutic agents are chosen because of their ability to interfere with oncologic cell division. The treatment of ALL involves 3 phases: remission induction, consolidation, and maintenance therapy. Pediatric patients with ALL are often given 8 or more months of intensive chemotherapy. This is often followed by maintenance therapy of two or more years (Gedaly-Duff et al., 2006). Most treatment protocols use systemic chemotherapy with or without radiotherapy (McCance & Huether, 2010).  According to a study conducted by McDonald & Mc Carthy (2005), success of chemotherapy and remission depends on “aggressive induction chemotherapy followed by delayed intensification and maintenance therapy, p. 809.”

1. Chemotherapy is frequently used for childhood cancer because what it does is it stops the cancer cells from growing either by stopping the division of the cells or by killing them. (Bernard, Samantha C. et al., 2017)

When first considering cancer treatment plans, it helps to understand your general options. Types of cancer treatment can be categorized into four modalities: Medical, surgical, radiation, and chemotherapy. Examples of medical options include chemical medicines, immunotherapy, and biological/endocrine therapy. Many surgical options can be minimally invasive and utilize modern technologies to better suit the patient's personalized treatment plan. While you may have heard of radiation and chemotherapy, you may not realize the recent advancements that improve these therapies, creating healthy, successful outcomes every day.

They may be applied to bloodstream or directly to a cancer site. Chemotherapy typically refers to the destruction of cancer cells, however some may include antibiotics or other medications to cure an illness or infection. Often, chemo is used alongside other treatments. Physical activity is important and it’s been found that patients who regularly exercise after chemotherapy treatment have a much lower risk of cancer recurrence. Chemotherapy generally has 5 goals; total remission, combination therapy, delay/prevent reoccurrence, slow down cancer progression and relieve cancer symptoms. The objective is to prevent cell division using cytotoxic drugs, to target cancer cells food source, enzymes and hormones that they need in order to grow, and to stop the growth of new blood vessels that supply the tumor. Patients can either receive monotherapy where they’re just given one drug, or combination where the patient receives more than one drug. These courses of chemo can be just a one day treatment or last for a few weeks, it depends on the type and stage of the cancer basically how advanced it

* Hormonal Therapy: Some cancers need hormones to grow, used to block cancer cells from getting hormones to grow.

Chemotherapy is the administration of chemicals into the body in an attempt to cure/lessen the severity of cancer in living organisms. Chemotherapy is always given with a curative intent, but that cannot always be promised to the patient, so sometimes it is given to relieve symptoms that the patients are experiencing or to improve their overall quality of life.1 While chemotherapy is used as an agent to try to rid individuals of their cancer, it is essentially slowly killing them. The chemicals used for the treatment are toxic to the human body and while they are giving them in small amounts, those small amounts accumulate over time to large amounts in the body. The body is affected by the treatment in various different ways and every body

Cancer can’t be cured, but it may be controlled for a time by chemotherapy. Its goal is to stop or slow down the growth of a tumor or shrink it at least partially or to decrease any pain, bleeding, abstractions

Therefore, dose and duration of treatment is limited, which in turn limits the amount of normal and tumor cell death. A second mechanism is the suppression of cancer cells for variable periods of time without cell death. This mechanism is referred to as remission. Unfortunately, the cancer can return at any time, and it is sometimes stronger. Here another limitation is introduced. Some tumor cells can develop resistance to a particular chemical agent, or several chemical agents, limiting the types of chemotherapeutic agents available for effective use. The last mechanism is cell differentiation, which helps the immune system learn to recognize and fight tumor cells (1).

The first stage is called induction therapy. With induction therapy, the goal is to kill as many leukemic cells as possible in the blood and bone marrow. Restoring normal blood cell production is also a goal with induction therapy. Consolidation therapy is the second phase. Also called post-remission therapy, the goal is to destroy any remaining leukemia in the body. The third phase is maintenance therapy. The goal of maintenance therapy is to prevent leukemia cells from re-growing. Often, this phase is given in low doses over a period of time, most likely over a few years. Sometimes prevention therapy is given during the phases of treatment. Prevention therapy is given to kill any leukemia in the central nervous system. During prevention, chemotherapy is injected directly into the fluids surrounding the spinal cord. As a whole, the phases of treatment are given over a span of 2-3 years, depending on each

treatment methods such as chemotherapy that depending on the stage and the degree of cancer.

Chemotherapy is given in cycles a treatment period followed by a recovery period, then another treatment period and so on. The drug enters the blood stream and destroys leukemia cells throughout the body. However, they cannot reach the brain and spinal cord, because of a protective network of blood vessels that keep foreign substances from entering the central nervous system. In certain cases doctors need to inject the drug directly into the fluid that surrounds the brain and spinal cord. (Health a to z, 20)

• Chemotherapy. Chemotherapy is the use of medicines to stop or slow the growth of cancer cells.