By Sandra Ray, Staff Writer
Stage III Treatment:
Stage III ovarian cancer is treated much the same
as stage II cancer, although the chemotherapy
involved is much more aggressive. Radiation therapy
becomes more likely at this stage, especially given
that the cancer is much more aggressive and has
spread further into the body. Since the prognosis
drops significantly with stage III ovarian cancer,
doctors will use combination chemotherapy during
their treatment.
Surgery becomes possible both before chemotherapy
and after. The second round of surgery is done
primarily to ensure that all of the cancerous tissue
has been removed and none has escaped undetected,
either by the first surgery or by the chemotherapy
sessions. Survival rates drop significantly with
stage III ovarian cancer, report UMMC, with a five
year survival rate of 20 percent.
Stage IV Treatment:
Stage IV ovarian cancer has the poorest prognosis
according to UMMC with only 10 percent of women
surviving after five years. Doctors concentrate
heavily on surgery and chemotherapy in order to
treat the disease. More than one round of both types
of treatment is often utilized since the disease has
metastasized or spread into many different areas of
the body by now and can rapidly grow undetected by
doctors.
Radiation Therapy Issues:
When assessing the role of radiation therapy,
patients and caregivers need to understand the
reason why it is used or not used in specific cases.
Ovarian cancer cells actually respond quite well to
radiation therapy and tend to shrink quickly.
Radiation therapy, however, can cause problems for
healthy cells n the affected area. For example, when
treating ovarian cancer that has moved into the
abdomen, doctors do not like to “radiate” the entire
abdominal area for fear that healthy tissue will be
destroyed by the treatment. (Years ago, this type of
approach was used, and it has since lost its
popularity.)
If a doctor feels they can focus the area that
needs to receive radiation, it is definitely
considered as a treatment option. If, however, the
whole abdomen needs radiation, the doctor will more
likely resort to using different types of
chemotherapy to treat the disease rather than risk
destroying tissue through radiation and increasing
the amount of toxicity in the body.
Treating Recurrent Cancer:
Treating the disease the first time does not
guarantee that the disease is gone entirely.
Researchers in Rockville, MD reported in 2000 that
that “emergence of drug-resistant tumors during
therapy for ovarian cancer remains an obstacle to
improving long-term outcomes.” In other words, more
types of ovarian cancer are becoming resistant to
the type of chemotherapy drugs available on the
market today making the disease more likely to
either continue to spread or to recur after the
first round of treatment is completed.
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