‘Diagnosis cancer’ – this is a life-changing moment for many people. Cancer is the second most common cause of death worldwide, after cardiovascular diseases. In 2012, some 8.2m people died as a result of cancer.1 The World Health Organization forecasts that this number will continue to rise until 2030. Fortunately, recent years have seen a quiet revolution in terms of treatment, with an improved understanding of the molecular biology of tumour cells leading to increasing success in addressing the specific factors that distinguish each patient’s illness.
For men, the most common diagnoses involve cancers of the lungs and prostate, while for women it is breast cancer. And for breast cancer there are already 20 different subtypes. Malignant tumours occur when sections of DNA change, and the body is no longer able to counteract these mutations. Furthermore, the gene repair system becomes increasingly unreliable with age. The overall risk of developing cancer depends on a combination of hereditary factors, lifestyle habits and environmental influences – smoking, excess weight, UV radiation exposure, certain viruses and inhaled particulates.2 Therefore, cancer can be ultimately understood as a collection of different mutations. As a result, the best chance of success is generally found in combining different treatments, whether in parallel or sequentially.
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