Treatments for Mesothelioma

Mesothelioma is a cancerous disease which affects the cells that that line the body's serous cavities and internal organs and the traditional treatments for this include radiation therapy, chemotherapy, surgery or different combinations of these three treatments. The reason why treatment methods for mesothelioma differ is due to factors such as the stage of the disease, location of the cancer cells and the patient’s individual decisions.

Surgery is performed for either alleviating the pain or removing the cancer cells from the affected organs. In some cases it may not be possible to remove all parts over which the illness has spread surgical intervention however may help reduce the pain. “palliative procedures.” and “pneumonectomy” are the two major types of surgeries used to treat mesothelioma.

In palliative procedures, mesothelioma isn’t healed but the surgery helps with the pain and relieves the symptoms. There are various palliative procedures including “pleurectomy/decortication” and “Thoracentisis”. In the latter, a needle is inserted into the chest cavity to drain fluids to either relieve the pain or diagnose where as in Pleurectomy/decorticationthe pleura is removed to prevent a pleural effusion from reoccurring and to help decrease the pain.

Pneumonectomy involves surgically removing the lung. This can be done in one of two ways either a “traditional pneumonectomy” which involves the diseased lung being removed or an “extrapleural pneumonectomy” where part of the diaphragm, parietal pleura or pericardium is removed along with the diseased lung.

Another important traditional treatment for mesothelioma that is used to kill malignant cells by injecting medicines into the diseased areas directly through a vein is chemotherapy. This treatment also involves the use of drugs to prevent the cancer cells from multiplying. Chemotherapy may even destroy healthy cells in addition to the malignant cells thus the side effects of this treatment can be severe and include hair loss, vomiting, nausea, fatigue, mouth sores, decreased appetitive and constipation.

Radiation therapy uses X-ray like high energy rays to damage the mesothelioma cancer cells in a localized area. Any healthy cells that are damaged during this treatment can repair themselves more effectively as compared to chemotherapy. Fatigue, skin irritation, difficult breathing, nausea and hair loss are some of the side effects of this treatment.