When we talk about cancer, those with the highest incidence such as breast, uterus, pancreas and skin, are for which there is a wide deployment of prevention campaigns, but among them there is also lung cancer, of which Dr. Erika Serrano, specialist in oncology, it warns us that it has the highest mortality rate in Latin America and its diagnosis usually occurs in advanced stages, because the symptoms are nonspecific.
According to statistics from Globocan (Global Cancer Observatory) 2018, in Ecuador this type of cancer is in position number 9, which translated into numbers is 1,300 cases per year. The expert explains to us about the details of this disease.
What are the triggers for lung cancer and how and when should I get screened?
Risk factors are everything that affects the probability of developing the disease. Having one or more risk factors does not mean that you have the disease. And cigarette smoking is one of the biggest triggers, but a quarter of lung cancer patients are not smokers, which is why it is attributed to different agents of environmental or occupational exposure such as asbestos, wood smoke, among others.
There is no diagnostic method for prevention as in other types of cancer. But in first-world countries, low-dose annual CT (Computed Tomography) is performed in people aged 55 to 85 years with a history of smoking, which allows to be alert and detect initial stages.
Which patients are the most likely to suffer from it?
The WHO (World Health Organization) indicates that 64% of cases suffer from it due to tobacco consumption, and the remaining 36% are due to indoor and outdoor air pollution, residential radon gas and arsenic in the drinking water.
What is the treatment and life expectancy of patients who suffer from it?
In recent years, the advent of Target therapies, personalized therapies and immunotherapy, through genetic studies, has allowed not only to prolong life, but to cure more and more patients, although this figure continues to be low, it is a rate of survival that can fluctuate approximately between 5 to 7 years, unlike the response obtained with chemotherapy, with greater toxicity and with a survival rate that does not exceed 15 months.
How to prevent it?
There is no prevention as such, but there is avoiding the greatest risk factor that is tobacco, as well as going to a specialist doctor at the time of presenting respiratory symptoms that are an alarm such as cough that does not subside or increases, hemoptysis , dyspnea (feeling short of breath), weight loss, bone pain.
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