Cancer Treatment Centers
What is Cancer?
All cells in a human body grow, reproduce and die. This is a normal and continuous process. However, there may be times when some cells in a particular part of the body grow out of control. This is how Cancer occurs. Such cancerous cells do not die in the normal way. The cancer cells harm the body, form lumps or tissue masses called tumors. Cancers are of many types; up to 100 different types have been found and are being studied.
Cancer can be inherited from members of the immediate family as a result of a person being born with a certain genetic mutation. The risk of developing cancers in such people is higher.
Need for Treatment
The treatment of cancer depends on how early it is detected, the part of the body that has been affected and the cures, if any, available. Not all cancers can be cured. When a doctor detects a cancer in a patient, he or she would not first inform the patient. The immediate family is first informed, and they take a call on whether and how much the patient should be told.
Being told that you or your loved ones have cancer is an extremely traumatic experience. The family feels overwhelmed and often at a loss what to do. They have questions which they need to put to the doctor, but even to venture on such a course takes a lot of mental strength. A major part of the treatment of a cancer patient consists of counseling and guidance for both the patient and their loved ones on.
Identifying a Treatment Center
In most cases, by the time someone has confirmed, through tests and medical consultation, that he or she has cancer, a doctor has already been identified. If this is not the case, the first task for the family would be to find such a doctor who can provide the best possible treatment.
An oncologist is a doctor who has specialized in diagnosing and treating cancer. An oncologist could be a Medical Oncologist who treats the disease with medicines, a Surgical Oncologist who treats with the help of surgery, or a Radiation Oncologist who treats with the help of it is often unclear which course of treatment would be most appropriate, and may often require the services of two, or even all the three of the above, it is best to identify a treatment center having doctors on their panel who have all the three specialties.
The center should also have social workers, trained in interacting with and supporting the loved ones. As counseling is major part of the treatment, both for the cancer patient and the family, it is extremely important that the center selected has the services of a qualified and competent psychologist. While this is true of most diseases of the mind and body, in cancer, addressing the stresses on the mind is an essential part of the treatment protocol.
Finding the Right Doctor
Unless the particular cancer calls for some very specific treatments, which are rare and practiced at only very few centers in the country, an important consideration for choosing a treatment center might be proximity to home. This is essentially because support from peers, friends and colleagues - people the patient has known for years - is extremely important.
A cancer patient would like to talk, and needs good listeners in a group he or she can trust. A doctor from the neighborhood, provided he or she is qualified and competent, is ideal, as they are in most cases known, if not to the family, to friends and relatives. It is vital that the treating doctor appears to take a personal interest and addresses the many queries of the patient and his and her family.
Cancer Survivors Network
While on the face of it, the support of a Cancer Survivors Network might seem to be extremely beneficial, it might not always be so. Most often, cancer patients and their families, at least in the initial stages of detection, are in denial. In later stages of the disease, when treatment is on, and particularly for those whose chances of recovery are high, interaction with cancer survivors can be a huge morale booster.
