What are the treatments for tongue cancer

Many patients with tongue cancer, due to their lack of knowledge about tongue cancer, think that they are hopeless. Therefore, many patients with tongue cancer are under tremendous pressure both physically and mentally. In fact, tongue cancer can be cured. So what are the treatments for tongue cancer? Let’s learn about it together.

Western medicine treatment:

1) Treatment of primary lesions Radiotherapy, simple surgical resection or cryosurgery can be considered for early-stage well-differentiated tongue cancer. Comprehensive treatment should be used for advanced tongue cancer, using radiotherapy plus surgery or triple (chemotherapy, surgery, radiotherapy) or quadruple (triple plus traditional Chinese medicine or immunotherapy) therapy according to different conditions.

1. Radiotherapy: It can be used as an adjuvant treatment before and after surgery for advanced tongue cancer.

2. Surgery: It is the main method for treating tongue cancer. For T1 cases, wedge-shaped resection more than 1 cm away from the lesion can be performed and sutured directly; for T2-T4 cases, hemiglossectomy or even total glossectomy should be performed. As an important organ for mastication and speech, reconstruction should be performed when more than 1/2 of the tongue is missing.

3. Chemotherapy: Preoperative induction chemotherapy can be performed for advanced cases. Chemotherapy has a good effect on tongue cancer and is expected to improve the patient's survival rate.

4. Cryotherapy: Cryotherapy can be considered for T1 and T2 tongue cancer.

(II) Treatment of metastatic lesions: Due to the high metastasis rate of tongue cancer, all cases except T1 should be considered for selective neck dissection at the same time; for patients with clinically positive lymph nodes, therapeutic neck dissection should be performed at the same time.

Traditional Chinese Medicine Treatment:

First, treat based on syndrome differentiation: For the same tumor, each patient has different constitutions, different early, middle and late stages, and different complications, so the manifestations are not exactly the same. Therefore, when treating, Chinese medicine will prescribe the right medicine for the right condition, with both fixed main prescriptions and flexible additions and subtractions of medicines. One prescription for each person, and treatment based on syndrome differentiation, is the essence of Chinese medicine for thousands of years, which is both scientific and reasonable. This is one of the distinctive features of how Chinese medicine treats tongue cancer.

Second, TCM focuses on whole body conditioning and focuses on treating the root cause: this is the advantage of TCM in treating tongue cancer that is incomparable to that of Chinese and Western medicine. Professor Yuan Xifu, a famous TCM anti-cancer expert and the father of triple balance therapy, found in clinical practice that almost all cancer patients have three basic etiologies and pathogenesis: deficiency of vital energy, phlegm coagulation and blood stasis, and cancer toxin aggregation, which can be simply summarized as "deficiency, stasis, and toxicity" (triple balance); targeting deficiency, stasis, and toxicity, TCM conditioning can achieve the purpose of strengthening the body, replenishing deficiency, eliminating phlegm and removing blood stasis, and attacking toxins and dispersing knots. Ultimately, the patient's qi, blood, yin and yang are restored, and the human body reaches the fundamental balance in its natural state.

Third, it is safe and has no toxic side effects: Traditional Chinese medicine treatment has no risk of surgical accidents and anesthesia accidents, no surgical complications, no pain from surgical sequelae, and no toxic side effects of chemotherapy; and the drugs are all natural Chinese herbal medicines.

Fourth, it is easy for patients to accept: Chinese medicine treatment does not require surgery, chemotherapy, hospitalization, pain, risk, or toxic side effects, and costs little. The best advantage is that patients do not have to stay in a depressing hospital atmosphere but can be treated at home and recover under the care, encouragement, and care of their family.

Patients with tongue cancer should choose the treatment that suits them according to their condition. In addition, patients must follow the doctor's instructions and provide good nursing and dietary care to truly achieve the goal of curing and controlling the disease.