Commonly Asked Questions --- Medical Oncology/Hematology and Infusion Center
What does Grade mean?
It gives an indication of how aggressive a cancer is, slow, medium, or fast growing (low, intermediate, or high grade).
What does Stage mean?
It tells you how advanced (how early or how late) a cancer is: stage 0, 1 (I), 2 (II), 3 (III), or 4 (IV). Stage 1, 2, 3, could sometimes be further separated into A or B, or C. Stage 4 is normally the most advanced stage, called metastatic disease.
Can patient with Stage 4 cancer still be Cured?
Yes, in some disease, such as lymphoma, testicular cancer (germ cell cancer), most of patients could be cured still. In some other situations, cure may still be possible for stage 4 or relapsed cancer.
Chemotherapy: Regimens and Drugs- there are more than 100 drugs and 1600 regimens for treatment of cancer.
Cancer Drugs: For information about each individual drug, you may go to this website (chemocare.com) or NCI website.
Are all drugs used to treat cancer chemotherapy drugs?
No. With rapid advances being made in developing new drugs for cancer therapy, many of the new drugs developed or being developed belong to a new class called---small molecule inhibitors, such as tyrosine kinase inhibitors. Examples of these drugs are: Gleevec (Imatinib), Sutent (Sunitinib), Nexavar (Sorafenib), Erlotinib (Tarceva), and many others. They are used to treat chromic myelogenous leukemia CML), kidney cancer, gastrointestinal stromal tumor, lung cancer and others. Despite they are not chemotherapy drugs, they possess many potential serious side effects. Drugs such as Rituxan and Herceptin which are protein products made of antibodies, possess relatively fewer side effects.
How Can I assess response to chemotherapy:
Chemotherapy is used for two purposes: for improving the chance of cure and for controlling cancer from getting worse to extend life expectancy when cure is not possible. When cure is a goal, such as in breast cancer after surgery, a treatment can improve the chance of a cure with certain estimated benefit (percentage of reduction on risk of relapse, or in another word, inproving the chance of cure), but doctor would not be able to tell you if you are completely cured or not. In a situation that cancer is not curable, effectiveness of a certain treatment could be assessed by whether or not the tumor is shrunk (using CT scan, MRI, PET scan), by whether or not a blood test value for tracing that particular type of cancer (such as PSA, CA125, etc.) is going down or not.
Commonly Asked Questions about Technologies Supporting Cancer Diagnosis and Therapy
What's Ultrasound?
When is it used for detecting breast cancer? It's used for examining a specific area of breast that's suspected of palpable abnormality.
Can ultrasound replace mammogram?
No.
What's CT Scan?
You can see three-dimensional slices of any part of your body.
What's MRI?
Magnetic Resonance Imaging, especially useful in scanning brain and spinal cord.
What's PET Scan?
Can detect abnormal activites of entire body.
