Tobacco & Cancer
Lung cancer is not more of an abnormal growth, messy and disorganized in the cells of the appliance bronchial and lung. There are several types of lung cancer; it should be noted that not all are equal. It must be borne in mind two major groups; those who are known as small cell lung cancer and non-small cell.
The most frequent is the non-small cell, which represents approximately 85% of cases. In recent years has been achieved to subdivide into groups; Adenocarcinoma: This is intimately associated with the exposure to smoke from wood and is one of the cancers that will be seen more in the Nicaraguan Population of female sex by the risk factor of the exposure of the wood smoke and not necessarily associated with smoking. Squamous Cancer: this itself is intimately associated to tobacco.
The other group (small cell) represents a combination between the association of tobacco and exposure to wood smoke. There is another group that is called not classifiable; this was due to morphologically makes description or association to a combination of features cellular for the pathologist is a real challenge to describe it.
Symptoms
- A cough that doesn’t go away or gets worse over time.
- Blood in sputum (mucus coughed up from the lungs).
- Loss of weight and appetite
- Trouble breathing
- Feeling very tired
- Infections such as bronchitis and pneumonia that do not go away or continue to recur
- Wheezing
When lung cancer spreads to
other parts of the body, it can cause:
- Pain in the bones (such as pain in the back or hips)
- Nervous system disorders (such as headache, weakness or numbness of an arm or a leg, dizziness, problems with balance or convulsions) as a result of the spread of cancer to the brain.
- Yellowing skin and eyes (jaundice) due to spread of cancer to the liver.
- Lumps near the body surface due to spread of cancer to the skin or to lymph nodes (accumulation of cells immune system), such as the one presented in the neck or above the collarbone.
Pay attention to this symptoms. Don’t be alarmed, any doubt make it to your doctor
Exposure to tobacco or firewood is not only active, it’s passive too. Who is exposed to toxins that can develop smoking, burning firewood, etc., etc., it’s not only the patient who is in direct contact, but also the children, their husbands, wives, siblings, all those who coexist adjacent to the patient who is in touch with; Not to mention the toxins we’re going to see every time we develop industries. Unfortunately, industrialization processes are necessary for the development of an economy; but must be well regulated to prevent exposure to toxic substances that may be developed by the exposure of the products that we can develop by factories and others.
It must be borne in mind that those who work in mines are also predisposed to the development of lung cancer by a series of toxic substances that can be found in mines. Then this type of patients must carry a medical check-up different and obviously closer, more customized by the type of work they are developing.
When do you decide to find a specialist?
Any symptoms presented by a patient that already was evaluated by a doctor, but if the patient returns to the clinic or hospital due to continue with the inconvenience, it is of vital importance to be reevaluated by the doctor. Must be careful, especially those patients with tiredness, shortness (or cough) that go to the doctor and they say it is a bronchitis, but two or three weeks after remain the same or worse; they need a reassessment by the doctor to perform additional studies deepen in the symptoms in order to be clear that it is not before a malignant disease as is lung cancer or other disease of greater risk.
Source: National Cancer Institute
Checked: 05/04/2018