Essay on "Cancer: A Deep Study"

Essay 25 pages (8806 words) Sources: 20

[EXCERPT] . . . .

Epstein-Barr virus is a herpes virus. It can create infectious mononucleosis and has also been connected to nasopharyngeal cancer and non-Hodgkin lymphomas (Hajdu, part 1, 2011).

People who have been diagnosed with human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) can develop many other forms of cancer including non-Hodgkin lymphoma and Kaposi sarcoma (Hajdu, part 1, 2011).

HPVs commonly known as human papilloma viruses are linked with too many forms of cancers. Some of them exist in vagina, vulva, cervix and anus. Neck cancer and head cancer are also a case in point. Tongue and tonsils are an example of HPV here. It's a high risk situation. Now, a vaccine exists for averting HPV infection (Hajdu, part 1, 2011).

IARC is abbreviated as International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC). It's a part of World Health Organization. It has now found at least 100 biological, physical and chemical carcinogens. The scientists were working to find out the development of cancer long before these associations came into existence. Now the research is discovering latest carcinogens and defines their cause for cancer. They also provide insight on ways to avert cancer (Hajdu, part 1, 2011).

During the 20th century, the scientists had everything to work on the disease of cancer which nevertheless continued to baffled them. They worked on biology and chemistry problems. Francis Crick and James Watson attained a Nobel Prize in 1962 for their efforts in determining the DNA's chemical structure. DNA is the basic form in genes (Hajdu, part 1, 2011).

DNA was responsible for the genetic code and gave specific orders to cells. The scientists could translate the code first and then began to comprehend how genes operated and how were they damaged by mutations (alterations in genes and changes). This modern study cleared many misconceptions and prejudices about cancer that were held quiet strongly before (Hajdu, part 1, 2011).

Scientists did know that cancer was a resultant of viruses, radiation, chemicals and sometimes it ran deep in family inheritance. DNA and genes understanding did increase with time, the scientists also learned that chemicals and radiation did affect the DNA sequences and altered them which resulted in cancer development. Then, the aim was to determine the location of a probable damaged gene (Hajdu, part 1, 2011).

Scientists did discover that defective genes were inherited in some cases and these inherited genes tend to get defective when chemical effects pull through with full force. In layman language, the factors that caused cancer (carcinogens) also damaged genes causing mutations. The mutation seems like inherited ones and can possibly cause various forms of cancer if left unattended (Hajdu, part 1, 2011).

It doesn't matter how the first mutation was formed (created or inherited), the cells formed due to such mutations also created groups of abnormal cells known as clones and duplicates of anomalous cell. The mutant clones became even more dangerous clones with the passage of time. The cancer became more and more hazardous. The genes were damaged and mutated.

There is a difference between normal tissue cells and cancer cells. Normal cells when damaged die while cancer cells after damage remain active. This major difference was a huge breakthrough for scientists after many centuries (Hajdu, part 1, 2011).

Early detection and cancer screening

For identifying a disease, screening tests are often done. Cancer doesn't have many symptoms for that matter. The Pap test is the first screening test for cancer identification. The name came from George Papnicolaou. The test was about researching on menstrual cycle. In 1923, Papanicolaou came out successfully with results in cervical cancer. The doctors were obviously skeptical at first. The American Cancer Society (ACS) came to his rescue and started promoting the test in the 1960's. The test was a massive hit (Hajdu, part 2, 2011).

After that, rate of cervical cancer in United States of America had gone down by seventy percent. In the late 1960's, modern mammography methods were invented. They were up for recommendation by ACS in 1976 (Hajdu, part 2, 2011).

The present American Cancer Society had methods for detection of cancer earlier in colon, rectum, breast, cervix, endometrium and prostate. They also advise on checkups from time to time. The age factor and gender are taken in account. The areas up for inspection include

Skin

Mouth

Thyroid

Lymph nodes

Ovaries

Testes

(Hajdu, part 2, 2011).

Surgery: Cancer treatments through the ages

The ancient surgeons and doctors knew that cancer tended to come back after its careful removal. Celsus, a Roman physician wrote that, "A scar has formed after excision, but even after that, the disease comes back" (Hajdu, part 2, 2011)

In the 2nd century, a Roman doctor Galen studied cancer and his books were deemed gems. For a thousand years, he was deemed as the father of modern medicine. Galen delved into cancer just as much as Hippocrates did. His observations set the path in motion for cancer for many centuries: he states that the patient was incurable, even after a diagnosis of cancer (Hajdu, part 2, 2011).

Medicine progressed and propagated in civilizations, the cancer department saw little or no progress. For most part, the approach was taken on in terms of Galenic and Hippocratic. The same concept of cancer as incurable disease crept into the 19th century. People have feared this disease since the dawn of time. People still deem cancer as incurable today and cancel appointments to a potential treatment which can save their lives (Hajdu, part 2, 2011).

The process of developing a treatment for cancer disease has been deliberate and slow. It was standardized by the ancients that cancer cannot be cured by any means once it had spread, and the development of cure will be more dangerous. However, surgical treatments intended for breast cancer were suggested by Galen only if the tumor is totally detached in early phase of disease. These surgeries caused complications like blood loss etc. Therefore, till the end of 19th and start of 20th century there was a major progress in development of general and cancer surgeries.

Before the discovery of anesthesia, great surgeons like John hunter, Astly Cooper and John warren were well-known for their commendable and precise surgical skills. However, in 1846 when anesthesia was implemented, there was a rapid development in this domain, and then the next hundred years that followed were recognized as "the century of the surgeon."

Surgeons who contributed majorly to this mass development of cancer sciences and arts are known as Bilroth (contributed in Germany), Handley (worked in London), and Halsted (from Baltimore). Their effort and research made a way to "cancer operations" which was designed to eradicate the whole tumor, and lymph nodes existing where the tumor took place.

William Stewart Halsted, professor (surgery) at Johns Hopkins University, worked on the radical mastectomy and came up with it in the ending decade of the 19th century. He exerted on the already researched work of a surgeon from London, W. Sampson Handley, who alleged that cancer extends itself outwardly by invasion from the initial growth. However, this concept and idea of radical mastectomy and lumpectomy was initially given by a German writer who wrote about it in his book "Chirurgie" in 1719 (Hajdu, part 2, 2011).

Halsted's belief was that that cancer doesn't extend it roots through the blood stream. Observing breast cancer he was not sure if metastasis seemed to have definitely transferred or passed through blood vessels. He supposed that proper removal of cancer cell is the cure, however if the cancer spreads and is found somewhere else, the treatment could be a new process. This idea of his, led to his development of the radical mastectomy for breast cancer which further became a benchmark for cancer surgeries for a century. Afterwards, in the 1970s, advanced clinical trials revealed that for women with breast cancer, surgeries which are less extensive could also work equally and effectively (Hajdu, part 2, 2011).

In the present day, radical mastectomy doesn't takes place and the "modified radical mastectomy" is also carried out less than before. Breast cancer affected women and forced them to get the "modified radical mastectomy" and after that a radiation therapy (Hajdu, part 2, 2011).

While Halsted and Handley were working on their radical operations, there was an English surgeon named Stephen Paget who had a query about the factor that concludes about organs which shall be suffering if there is a disseminated cancer. They further believed that cancer cells extend their roots through blood vessels and but there are only a few organs which suffer where cancer cells grow, thus through his brilliant logic he drew a fine line and differentiated between cancer metastasis and seeds which spread in every direction but survive and breed if collapsed with congenial soil (Hajdu, part 2, 2011).

Paget's theory about cancer cells from the initial stage of tumor which spread through the blood vessels but only few of them breed and only in selective organs… READ MORE

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