Treatment and Cures For Ovarian Cancer

Cancer can be a difficult disease to treat and cure fully. Due to the different types of tumors that comprise of cancer as whole, no single type of treatment is fully effective after a certain stage. After one has been diagnosed with ovarian cancer, there are different courses of treatment that one can choose from. There are no sure fire cures for ovarian cancer, but a combination of surgery, chemotherapy and intensive medication work very well for almost all patients. Depending on which stage the cancer has advanced to, treatment can be decided. There exist three main types of treatment for ovarian cancer, namely surgery, chemotherapy and radiation treatment.

The most common treatment for stage I and benign tumors is the removal of all cancerous tissue through surgery. This can be limited to removing only some pieces of tissue or the entire ovary and fallopian tube altogether. In severe cases, the uterus may also be removed. This is known as a hysterectomy and is common when there is no risk factor for recurrence of any cancer. If the tumor removed is high grade in nature, then some chemotherapy may also be given in accordance to the type of the tumor. Surgery is also helpful in making an exact diagnosis about ovarian cancer to start with and is seen as the safest method of treatment due to low chances of any risk.

For those patients whose cancer has entered Stage II or III, chemotherapy happens to be the best option. Chemotherapy uses fast acting drugs to kill off all the cancerous cells in the body. the only problem faced by those undergoing chemotherapy is the fatigue, constant nausea and other such problems suffered due to temporary decrease in the body cell count. Chemotherapy can be combined with surgery even in stages II and III of the disease. For those with malignant tumours, a combination of radiation therapy is suggested since it can be quite useful in removing all traces of the affected tissue in the body. However, by stage III there are chances that the cancer may have spread to other parts of the abdomen and so treatment can be ineffective to a certain degree.

For stage IV patients, radiation treatment is used in combination with surgery or chemotherapy. This is a rarely used and risky treatment, where high energy x-rays are used to kill the cancer cells. The treatment at this stage mainly involves removal of as much cancer as possible by all different means. At stage IV, cancer has most probably spread to other parts of the body and has a high chance of recurrence even with intensive treatment to prevent the same. However, the use of radiation therapy is useful to a large extent in removing cancer from most parts of the body and allowing other methods to take out the benign tumorous growths. For those who suffer from drug resistance during chemotherapy or radiation sickness, the best recourse is to go in for a full hysterectomy and salvage chemotherapy with stronger drugs.