How long does it take for the esophageal pain to recover after radiotherapy for esophageal cancer? Normally about a month

Patients with esophageal cancer need 5-10 radiotherapy sessions. During radiotherapy, congestion and edema of the esophageal mucosa may occur. The stimulation of eating may cause ulceration or inflammation of the esophageal mucosa, accompanied by esophageal pain. Patients with severe symptoms take symptomatic treatment such as anti-inflammatory treatment. The diet should be light and easy to digest. It is not advisable to eat sour, spicy, irritating, dry, hard, and rough foods. One month after the end of radiotherapy, the patient's esophageal discomfort symptoms can gradually recover. If they have not recovered in 3 months, further examination is required to avoid delaying diagnosis and treatment.

Esophageal cancer is a common malignant tumor of the digestive tract. The main clinical symptoms include progressive dysphagia, which is typically manifested by obvious difficulty in eating hard food, and then being unable to eat or only being able to eat a small amount of liquid food. In my country, the common pathological type of esophageal cancer is squamous cell carcinoma. Radiotherapy currently plays a pivotal role in the treatment of esophageal cancer. So, how long will it take for the esophageal pain to recover after radiotherapy for esophageal cancer?
The duration of esophageal pain after radiotherapy for esophageal cancer is relatively long. Although radiotherapy is a local treatment, it has few systemic side effects. However, radiation damage to the esophagus after radiotherapy for esophageal cancer is common. It can manifest as pain when eating, and the incidence is generally high after 10-15 times during radiotherapy. Some patients also experience pain after the end of the radiotherapy cycle.
The treatment mainly focuses on relieving esophageal muscle spasms, protecting the esophageal mucosa, hormone shock therapy, improving immunity, and nutritional support therapy. According to clinical observation, the pain symptoms of general patients disappear after about one month of treatment after the pain occurs. Some patients have more serious radiation esophageal damage, and the recovery period may take about three months.
Pain caused by the progression of esophageal cancer. If esophageal cancer is not sensitive to radiation. During or after radiation, the tumor continues to develop and invades the nerves of the esophagus itself, causing pain. Analgesic treatment is needed first (common analgesics include nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs, mild opioid analgesics, and opioid analgesics). Anti-tumor treatment, such as chemotherapy, should be actively selected in addition to radiotherapy. If chemotherapy is effective, the pain usually subsides after two cycles of chemotherapy.
The above content is an introduction to how long it takes for esophageal pain to recover after esophageal cancer radiotherapy. I hope it can be helpful to patients. Finally, I remind patients to pay attention to healthy diet in daily life and eat more light and easy-to-digest foods. In addition, patients cannot rule out pain caused by tumor progression during treatment. Therefore, in the clinical treatment process, the cause must be identified first, and then the cause can be treated.