How much harm does chemotherapy do to the human body

It is a method of treating cancer in the medical field today. Chemotherapy can be used to shrink and kill cancer cells and reduce their growth. Now many people with cancer will be treated with chemotherapy, but chemotherapy will have some side effects and cause many complications to the human body. So do you know how much harm chemotherapy can cause to the human body?

Chemotherapy is one of the "pillars" in the treatment of malignant tumors. The art of its application lies in whether the effectiveness of chemical drugs can be maximized and the toxic reactions caused by them can be reduced, that is, to achieve "adequate use of drugs and timely cessation."

However, patients often find it difficult to grasp the degree of "timeliness": either they cannot tolerate the side effects of chemotherapy, and they stop and start the treatment or end it early; or they take it for granted that chemotherapy can prolong the patient's survival, and they continue with it aimlessly. In fact, there are rules to follow as to how long chemotherapy should last, which depends on three factors: the nature of the tumor, the treatment drugs, and the patient's physical condition.

Tumor properties determine the role of chemotherapy

Tumors with fast cell proliferation, such as certain highly malignant lymphomas, small cell lung cancer, choriocarcinoma, etc., grow rapidly, are sensitive to drugs, and can be easily "completely destroyed" by chemotherapy. Their characteristic is "progress if not regression."

Chemotherapy is the main treatment method. When starting treatment, it is necessary to "eradicate the evil completely". If it is stopped halfway, the tumor will come back again, which will often induce drug resistance of the tumor and it will be difficult to control it completely. Therefore, the principle of treatment should be "if not treat at all, then don't treat; if treated, then it must be sufficient". If the physical condition permits, sufficient consolidation chemotherapy must be given to strive for recovery.

In contrast, another type of tumor has cells that do not proliferate very quickly and are not sensitive to chemotherapy. For example, liver cancer, renal clear cell carcinoma, etc.

Therefore, the principle of chemotherapy should be "relieve pain and stop at the right time", that is, chemotherapy is often used to deal with wildly growing tumors and relieve pain, rather than as a means to achieve a complete cure. Chemotherapy is rarely used alone for this type of tumor, but is used in combination with targeted therapy, immunotherapy, etc. to achieve the best results.

Dynamic examination helps determine the duration of chemotherapy

So, for other tumors whose properties are between the above two, such as non-small cell lung cancer, breast cancer, gastric cancer, esophageal cancer, colorectal cancer and other digestive tract tumors and ovarian cancer and other reproductive system tumors, what kind of chemotherapy is most reasonable? The situation at this time is more complicated and it depends on the tumor.

If the patient has undergone surgery and the main tumor has been removed, the role of the drug is to eliminate the scattered tumor cells that may remain in the body. The chemotherapy at this time is called "adjuvant chemotherapy." The time for postoperative medication should not be extended indefinitely, but should have a reasonable time limit to ensure both "basic insurance" for the patient and no unnecessary pain.

The patient itself will suffer great physical harm because the chemotherapy process is relatively complicated, and chemotherapy will destroy the protective functions of various organs in our body. Therefore, the patient will experience a series of complications such as nausea and vomiting. Therefore, during chemotherapy, we must reasonably arrange the patient's physical health and provide auxiliary conditioning treatment.