O cancer it is a disease related to the disordered growth of cells, which kills about seven million people a year. There are more than 100 different types of cancer that can appear anywhere in the body, the most common being lung, breast, colorectal, stomach, liver and esophagus. Lung cancer leads the ranking number of deaths currently.
The wide variety of types of cancer and the many symptoms they cause make treatment difficult. Over time, it was realized that many cancers, which were considered to be of one type, were actually different types. Therefore, a fully effective treatment becomes difficult.
Traditionally, the treatment of different types of cancer is based on chemotherapy, radiotherapy, surgeries and, when it reaches the blood, bone marrow transplantation.
THE chemotherapy, one of the best known methods, is based on the use of drugs to attack cancer cells. Usually the administration occurs intravenously, however it can be done orally, intramuscularly, subcutaneously, intracranially and topically. Side effects are the most diverse, such as hair loss, nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, mouth sores, weakness and dizziness. The patient must be aware if there are high fevers, spots on the body, burning when urinating, pain, bleeding and breathing difficulties, in which case it is essential to seek a doctor.
Given the large amount of unpleasant effects caused by chemotherapy, there is a large number of researches for the manufacture of drugs that reduce these symptoms. ANVISA recently released a new drug, which should be sold from May 2014 in Brazil, which works in the treatment of a type of breast cancer called HER2 positive. O trastuzumab entansina (T-DM1) does not cause hair loss and, in addition, it causes fewer side effects when compared to chemotherapy and increases survival time by 50%. Due to its low toxicity, this drug can be used for a long period of time.
THE radiotherapy, instead of drugs, uses radiation to destroy tumors or reduce their size. The person who undergoes this treatment usually experiences tiredness, loss of appetite, and skin irritations. This treatment can be used after surgery and in conjunction with chemotherapy.
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In addition to chemotherapy and radiotherapy, it can be performed surgeries in order to remove the tumor. In blood diseases such as leukemia, it may be necessary to Bone marrow transplant, which is only done after the patient has poor results from other treatments, such as chemotherapy. For transplantation, it is necessary to find a compatible donor, which is initially searched within the family or in a registry of donors around the world.
The vaccines against cancer are still one of the great challenges for researchers, and there is still a great way to go until a vaccine can be produced that is really capable of eliminating the tumors. What we have today are some therapeutic vaccines, which can stop the growth of tumors, which can improve the quality of life of patients and increase life expectancy.
Given the variety of types of cancer and the number of deaths each year from the disease, research on forms of treatment is constant. A study published in January 2014 in the journal Science Translational Medicine demonstrated that it is possible to prevent the formation of invasive breast tumors by injecting RNA into cancer cells. Researchers created an RNA molecule with the aim of turning off the gene that was inducing this type of cancer (HoxA1). This study could be a major advance in terms of the treatment of breast cancer and, who knows, other types of cancer.
Therefore, we realize that researches to find a cure for the disease are frequent and are getting more and more promising results. However, much still needs to be done to find a cure.
By Ma. Vanessa dos Santos
