How to diagnose pancreatic cancer early

Pancreatic cancer has the worst prognosis among all tumors, but its incidence rate is increasing. Data show that the incidence rate has increased sevenfold in the past 30 years. In my country, the incidence rate of pancreatic cancer ranks seventh in both men and women, and the mortality rate ranks sixth in both men and women.

If you have upper abdominal discomfort or dull pain, yellowing of the skin, persistent back pain, upper abdominal fullness, flatulence, loss of appetite, general fatigue, and weight loss, you should be alert to pancreatic cancer. This is mainly because pancreatic cancer lacks specific symptoms in the early stages, and the above symptoms easily make people think it is a gastrointestinal disease or hepatobiliary disease. If gastroscopy and other related examinations have been performed to rule out gastrointestinal and hepatobiliary diseases, the possibility of pancreatic cancer should be considered, especially for some high-risk groups (middle-aged and elderly people, long-term smokers, obese people, diabetics, and patients with chronic pancreatitis). Abdominal color Doppler ultrasound and CT examinations should be performed to determine whether there is a pancreatic mass and the tumor marker CA19-9 should be tested. If abnormalities are found, a puncture biopsy of the pancreatic mass should be performed to clarify the nature of the lesion, which can buy time for early treatment. If conditions permit, it is best to perform an abdominal color Doppler ultrasound examination once a year for the above-mentioned high-risk groups to try to detect pancreatic lesions before symptoms appear.