Breast cancer is one of the most common malignant cancers among females, with an incidence rate exceeding that of cervical cancer and accounting for 7% to 10% of all the malignant cancers of the whole body. It seriously affects female patient’s physical and mental health, as well as their normal life.
As one of the systemic treatment methods for breast cancer, chemotherapy, including assistant chemotherapy before and after surgery, can improve patient’s survival rate and help extend their life. However, side-effects from chemotherapy are unavoidable. Many patients say that they can stand the painfulness of surgery but cannot endure that of chemotherapy.
First of all, let’s get to know what attention should be paid and what toxic side-effects may be caused by the common-used chemotherapy medicine during the chemotherapy process in conventional breast cancer treatment.
As there is no essential metabolism difference between cancer cells and normal cells, all anti-cancer medicines therefore will unavoidably damage normal tissues. Side-effects may be caused by chemotherapy in treating breast cancer include:
1. Some chemotherapy drugs can affect the intestinal mucosal cells and cause diarrhea.
2. Medicine like adriamycin can cause hair loss and damage patient’s heart.
3. Chemotherapy drugs can affect patient’s stomach or brain causing nausea and vomiting
4. Chemotherapy can inhibit the bone marrow from producing red blood cells, as a result, patients will feel fragile, fatigue, dizzy and short of breath.
5. Cytoxan can stimulate the bladder causing symptoms like painful urination, urgent urination, frequent urination and fever.
6. Anti-cancer medicines can affect the hematopoietic function of bone marrow causing decrease of white blood cells, meanwhile, infection in all body parts, like mouth, skin, lung and intestine, etc.
7. Chemotherapy can directly cause constipation, which may also be caused by lack of activity and improper diet structure after chemotherapy.
As chemotherapy can cause toxic side-effects, it is suggested to drink more water and have light diet and digestible foods during the chemotherapy treatment to reduce the damage of drugs to kidney. To maintain good reaction in gastrointestinal tract, patients can listen to some music and read art books and magazines to reduce their scare of the drugs and relax their brain to relieve tensions, thus to guarantee smooth processing of chemotherapy treatment. Since chemotherapy creates so many side-effects, are there better treatment methods for breast cancer?
Ar-He cryosurgery technique in Modern Cancer Hospital Guangzhou overcomes the shortcomings of being incomplete, easy to transfer and of great side-effects, which are shortcomings of the three traditional treatments, namely surgery, radiation therapy and chemotherapy. It is a kind of technique that can effectively kills cancer cells. Ar-He cryosurgery is the first high-precision treatment equipment developed with space rocket guided technology and the only one equipment with double effects of cryotherapy and heat treatment. It has been approved by U.S. FDA to be used in precisely targeted killing cancer cells. When argon is quickly released at the point of the needle, it can freeze the cancer tissues to 120℃ - 40℃ below zero and become ice balls in ten seconds. Thus, the cancer tissues within the ice ball are put into a situation lacking of blood and oxygen, with an extremely cold temperature of 165℃ below zero. They suffer from hunger and coldness, followed with coagulation necrosis. When helium is quickly released at the point of the needle, the temperature rapidly rises to 20℃ - 40℃. It quickly thaws and breaks down the solid ice ball and thus destroys the cancer tissues. Things including speed and time of temperature rising and dropping, size and shape of the ice ball, can be precisely set and controlled.
It is a painless, of less side-effect but effective treatment technique, which is more and more successfully used in clinic. Patients do no have to suffer from the painfulness and torture treating cancer and thus have their life respected and protected.