Introduction
Pancreatic cancer is one of the most deadly forms of cancer. It’s also one of the hardest to treat because it usually doesn’t have symptoms until it’s too late to save patients’ lives. But recently, there has been some good news: research into new treatments and early detection methods has made great strides in recent years. Let’s look at what we know about this disease and what doctors are doing to fight it!
The pancreas is nestled among the other organs in the abdomen.
You may have heard that the pancreas is a gland, but what exactly is it? The pancreas is a digestive organ that’s part of your endocrine system and produces hormones, including insulin. It also secretes digestive enzymes into your small intestine via ducts and tubes. One of these ducts—the main pancreatic duct—connects to this organ at its head, or front end.
The pancreas’ location helps explain why it’s important to keep an eye out for signs of cancer there: It’s nestled among other organs, so early detection can be challenging (and often requires multiple tests). Still, once you learn what symptoms might indicate that something isn’t quite right with your health care provider, seeking medical attention sooner rather than later could save your life.
Most patients diagnosed with pancreatic cancer already have an advanced stage of the disease by the time it’s found.
Why is it so hard to find? Because pancreatic cancer is rare. Only 7 percent of new cases are diagnosed in the early stages, when they’re more likely to be treatable with surgery or other therapies. In contrast, 70 percent are diagnosed at an advanced stage — just one reason that pancreatic cancer has a dismal 5-year survival rate of just 6 percent (compared to over 90 percent for many other cancers).
But there’s some good news: progress is being made in research on new treatments that could increase your chances of beating this deadly disease.
Pancreatic cancer is currently treated with chemotherapy, radiation, and surgery.
Pancreatic cancer is currently treated with chemotherapy, radiation and surgery. And unfortunately, the prognosis for this type of cancer is not very good.
According to the American Cancer Society (ACS), only three percent of people diagnosed with pancreatic cancer survive past five years. This low survival rate is due to the fact that most patients are only diagnosed after their disease has spread to other parts of the body. Unfortunately, this means that by the time they’ve been diagnosed their chances of surviving have decreased significantly.
Doctors hope to use genetic testing of tumors to help predict how patients will respond to these treatments.
Genetic testing of tumors could also help doctors determine which patients are likely to respond best to treatments. “We’ve had these drugs for a few years, but it’s been very difficult to pick out the patients who will benefit from them,” says Dr. Julie Sharp, chief medical officer at Cancer Research U.K., which is funding some of the research on pancreatic cancer genetics.
In particular, researchers want to use genetic tests to predict whether certain treatments will be effective against a patient’s tumor—and even which specific treatment they should get. For example, one study found that patients with mutations in two genes called KRAS and NRAS were less likely than others with pancreatic cancer tumors to respond well when treated with targeted drugs such as erlotinib (Tarceva) or cabozantinib (Cabometyx).
Pancreatic cancer researchers are now working on ways to spot the disease early and treat it more successfully.
- Detection
- Treatment
- Research
- Collaboration
- Funding
Researchers are making progress with early detection and new treatment options for pancreatic cancer.
You’ve probably heard that pancreatic cancer is one of the deadliest forms of cancer, with a survival rate below 5%. In fact, about 95% of patients are diagnosed in advanced stages.
But there’s good news: researchers are making progress with early detection and new treatment options for pancreatic cancer.
As you may know, pancreatic tumors can be detected during routine imaging tests such as CT scans or MRIs. But these types of tests often detect only small tumors that aren’t life-threatening yet—and they don’t find tumors hidden just beneath the surface of other organs. That’s why another type of testing is needed: ultrasound procedures that can detect smaller tumors than MRI exams do at an earlier stage in their development. The hope is that these ultrasounds will allow us to identify dangerous tumors before they have time to spread throughout the body, which would help us treat them more effectively—and maybe even prevent metastasis altogether!
Conclusion
Pancreatic cancer is a terrible disease, but researchers are making progress. With more studies like these and new treatments on the horizon, we can soon help even more patients with this devastating condition.