Cancer Metastasis Research Tells Us A Lot About How Cancerous Cells Work

By Timothy Stevens


Cancer is a diagnosis everyone dreads hearing. Even worse is the news that it is spreading, or metastasizing, and invading other parts of the body. This is life changing information. Cancers do not have to be fatal, but once they start traveling, controlling them is challenging. Cancer metastasis research has given doctors a lot of tools to work with. Understanding how cancerous cells move is one of them.

Metastasizing is what you don't want cancerous cells to do. This phenomenon is one of the things that makes the disease so serious. Affected cells can move anywhere on a person's body. They may not attack a neighboring organ as you would suppose. Cells use blood and lymph nodes to travel to far parts of the body. When they do this, cancers are considered stage four. When cancers move to other organs, they aren't renamed. They retain the name of the primary cancers.

Cancerous cells spread in a variety of ways. They may grow into, or attack normal tissue that is nearby. Cells may travel through the bloodstream to get to other parts of the body. The cells can stop anywhere in the blood vessels, invade the walls, and grow into small tumors. This creates new blood vessels and a blood supply that makes its possible for the new tumors to keep growing.

Cells can go anywhere, but there are certain organs that seem to attract specific cancerous cells. The lungs, liver, and bones are the most likely to be affected when cancers metastasize. The brain, liver, and lungs are the organs breast cancers usually move to. The adrenal glands can be infected by kidney cancers. Melanoma usually travels to the skin, brain, bones, lungs, muscles, and liver.

There are physical signs that cancerous cells have metastasized. When they have traveled to the lungs, patients often experience shortness of breath. Cancerous cells in the bones increase the chances that bones will fracture. Cells that have spread to the brain can cause seizures, headaches, and dizziness.

Once cancerous cells have metastasized, they are difficult to control. The way doctors treat them depends on a lot of factors including the type of primary disease, the treatments the patient has already received, and the general health of the individual. The goal is to stop or slow the growth of the cells and give the patient some relief from the symptoms. These treatments sometimes prolong the life of the patient.

Sometimes the treatments fail and doctors have to tell patients that the cells are out of control. At this point, the patient can choose to do several things. The treatments can be continued in the hope that cells will stop traveling and tumors will shrink. Palliative care is an option that will relieve side effects and reduce the discomfort of symptoms.

This is the time to make end of life decisions, if that has not already been done. A diagnosis of metastasized cancer is hard to hear. It is one great reason everyone should live their lives as though each day is the last.




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