Ovarian Cancer

Ovarian Cancer General Information

Ovarian Cancer Symptoms

Ovarian Cancer Treatment

Any type of cancer requires immediate and appropriate medical attention. You should seek medical advice as soon as possible if you have pain in your pelvis or abdomen. All tests must include a pelvic exam and it is recommended to visit another doctor for a second opinion. Even if you were diagnosed by your health care provider with Ovarian Cancer, before proceeding with any treatment, consult another one. It is important to know the medical history of your family because if you have cases of this type of cancer it is strongly recommended to see a specialist and to dispose of medical attention before the disease develops so that the complications not appear. A gynecologist should be involved in the patient’s care if she has Ovarian Cancer because he has the adequate training for this type of problems and he could give a more effective treatment. As many other forms of cancer, this one too involves both surgery and chemotherapy because a combination of these two proved to be efficiently in most of the cases. If the cancer is discovered in the early stages, the option to still have children is preserved because the surgeon will try to remove only the affected ovary and its fallopian tube. This case is very rare though and even, the subsequent chemo will destroy what is left leading to infertility.

There were some women who succeeded to have really healthy children. Sadly there are many women in the world who need a more serious operation, consisting in the extraction of both ovaries and their fallopian tubes. Very often this intervention requires also the extraction of the uterus, an abdominal tissue called omentum where the cancer usually develops and the lymph nodes that are nearby the uterus. The surgeon is always trying to remove as much cancerous tissue as possible from the abdomen, even if this procedure represents removing some parts of the intestines that are close to the tumor. The additional therapy is determined after the stage of the Ovarian Cancer is identified by analyzing samples of your body tissues and fluid for cells that might be cancerous. This evaluation is very important in saving the patient’s life. Any surgery is followed by chemotherapy, meaning that in your body will be introduced some drugs that will kill any cancer cells that remain after the operation and to avoid that the cancer reappear. The main medication includes combinations of Taxol (paclitaxel) and Paraplatin (carboplatin) that are given intravenously. This method has effects in 85% of the cases, reducing the volume of the tumor in a very good proportion and the risk of death, in comparison with other treatments used in the past years. If the Ovarian Cancer has an advanced form, the woman will receive a combination of intravenous and directly injected chemo that has proved to be a very good way to improve the survival rate. But these are not the only existing treatments for Ovarian Cancer. Some other more are still being explored and improved.