Treatments of Mesothelioma Canberra ACT

Mesothelioma Treatment-What are your options?

Surgery can either be palliative or curative. Curative surgery is only given to the patient when the tumor is not well advanced and when the patient is still young enough to withstand the stress of extensive radical surgery. This kind of surgery may involve the removal of the lining of the chest or abdomen and some of the tissue around it. For cancer of the pleura (pleural mesothelioma), a lung may be removed in an operation called a pneumonectomy. Sometimes part of the diaphragm, the muscle below the lungs that helps with breathing, is also removed.

Radiation therapy, also called radiotherapy, involves the use of high-energy rays to kill cancer cells and shrink tumors. Radiation therapy affects the cancer cells only in the treated area. The radiation may come from a machine (external radiation) or from putting materials that produce radiation through thin plastic tubes into the area where the cancer cells are found {internal radiation}

If you have been diagnosed with mesothelioma you should also educate yourself about mesothelioma and treatment options and reach out to available resources to make coping with a mesothelioma diagnosis easier.

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