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  • Study: Links Risk Of Developing Lung Cancer To Radiotherapy For Breast Cancer

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    The side effects will depend on the type of radiotherapy you have. A few weeks of treatment will usually give more side effects than treatment given in 1 or 2 doses. The side effects of radiotherapy for lung cancer usually come on slowly. They may last for a few weeks after your treatment has ended. Once the treatment is over, the side effects will gradually get better. A small number of people have long term side effects, which develop up to 2 years after treatment has finished.

    by Jeffrey Green

    While mainstream medicine continues to denigrate alternative cancer treatment such as cannabis and an array of natural treatments, radiation and chemotherapy continue to be presented as the sole routes to beating the horror of cancer.
    As Arjun Walia wrote recently in his article, “Here’s Why Radiation and Chemotherapy Should Not Be The Only Two Approved Treatments For Cancer:”

    A study published in the journal Cancer by researchers from the department of Radiation Oncology at the UCLA Johnson Comprehensive Cancer Center reports that radiation drives breast cancer cells into greater malignancy. Malignancy is a term used to describe the tendency of tumors and their potential to become progressively worse, ultimately resulting in death.

    In many cases, cancer stem cells are generated by the therapy itself, and they are resistant to conventional treatment, this may play a critical role in the development of tumors. Cancer stem sells are tumorigenic (tumor-forming) and are capable of both initiation and sustaining cancer. They are also increasingly recognized to be the cause of relapse and metastasis following conventional treatment.

    New research presented in Vienna, Austria backs up this concern.  Here is the full abstract, number O-0489 presented at the Clinical breast cancer session, 10.30-11.30 hrs (CEST) on Monday, 7 April.

    Women who have radiotherapy for breast cancer have a small but significantly increased risk of subsequently developing a primary lung tumour, and now research has shown that this risk increases with the amount of radiation absorbed by the tissue.

    Dr Trine Grantzau (MD) told the 33rd conference of the European Society for Radiotherapy and Oncology (ESTRO33) in Vienna: “We found that for each Gray delivered to the lung as part of radiotherapy for a breast tumour, the relative risk of developing a subsequent primary lung cancer increased. This increased risk was similar to the reported increased risk of heart disease after radiotherapy for breast cancer.

    Our findings suggest that any reduction in the dose of radiation to the lung would result in a reduction in the risk of radiation-induced subsequent lung cancers. With the advances in breast cancer treatment and the introduction of breast cancer screening, a growing number of women are becoming long-term survivors, and so we need to have an increased awareness of treatment-induced second cancers and take steps to reduce those risks by using radiotherapy techniques that spare normal tissue as much as possible.

    Long term side effects from radiotherapy may develop many months after your treatment has finished. Serious long term side effects are rare. If you have radiotherapy just to treat symptoms, you are very unlikely to have any long term effects. Even with intensive radiotherapy over 4 to 6 weeks to get rid of the cancer, long term side effects are still quite rare.

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    Staff Writer

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