Thursday, February 25, 2010

Malignant Peritoneal Mesothelioma

The peritoneum, which is the tissue that surrounds the abdomen, can fall victim to a cancer called malignant peritoneal mesothelioma. Your internal organs are allowed to work as efficiently as they do because of the fluid produced by this lining tissue. One out of every ten malignant mesothelioma is attributed to this particular cancer, making it scarcer than the disease that affects lung and chest lining, malignant pleural mesothelioma. No matter where you live, asbestos is typically the cause of most malignant mesotheliomas.

If you have malignant peritoneal mesothelioma, you can typically tell due to symptoms like swelling in the abdominal area, sudden loss of weight and appetite, nausea, constipation, and pain in the abdominal region. A lot of conditions can produce symptoms like these, and sometimes malignant peritoneal mesothelioma isn't diagnosed, because the patient has no idea or doesn't recall being exposed to asbestos.

If a doctor thinks you may have malignant peritoneal mesothelioma, they typically order MRIs or CT scans, so they can look for abdominal anomalies. In the event they find these things in a patient, a biopsy is also ordered to find out what kinds of cells exist within the tissue.

After a diagnosis is made, the kind of cancerous cell they find can greatly determine treatment and prognosis. You have a fairly good chance statistically surviving epithelioid cell cancers, as well as mixed cell cancers. However, you have reason to worry if you have sarcomatoid cell cancer. In these cases, patients commonly survive a single year, and only 10% of patients survive five. Since this prognosis is such a hazardous and urgent one, the doctor will try to get you started as soon as possible on the most aggressive treatments you can handle. Cancerous masses can be removed through surgery. The cancer cells that are left are killed off with chemotherapy and radiotherapy.


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