What is targeted therapy?
Unlike chemotherapy, which kills cells, which are in a similar phase of cell division, good or bad, targeted therapy “targets” specific proteins that are associated with the cancer cell. Some of those targets are Growth receptors (Epidermal Growth Factor Receptors) or EGFR, which then cannot send the growth signal to the interior of the cell. Cancer Cells are dependent on these receptors and enzymes they stimulate, to keep their fires stoked.
What is a bone marrow transplant?
Unlike a regular organ transplant (heart, liver, kidney e.g.) where the diseased organ is removed and replaced by a healthy donor organ, the bone marrow is not one organ. It is the loose tissue in the center of every bone in our body. The outer hard part is the cortex; the marrow occupies the inner hollow. It consists of a loose mesh of blood vessels and a fibrin network, which support “stem” cells, which go on to differentiate into the different cell lines, which go on to be circulating blood cells, which we talked about earlier in “what is a CBC”.
What is a Multidisciplinary Clinic?
Cancer treatment now requires a coordinated treatment plan, which involves surgery, radiation and chemotherapy. A multidisciplinary clinic is an opportunity to meet with all the specialists in one session. They then review all the biopsy findings with the pathologists and the radiological studies (CT scans, MRIs, mammograms, etc) with the radiologist, and recommend a course of action.
Chemotherapy drugs are to cancer cells what antibiotics are to bacteria. They interrupt the cell division process by preventing ongoing duplication of the cellular materials. As the immature cells die, new ones are not able to take their place and tumor growth is stopped. As chemotherapy is delivered in an ongoing fashion, more and more cancer cells are killed off, eventually, hopefully, getting them all.
Clinical trials are a process by which different treatments being evaluated against each other, or a brand new drug, to decide which is the best treatment for that particular disease, for that particular stage.
All current treatments have been selected as the standard of care, because they went through a clinical trial, and were found to be better that what they were being compared against. At any time, patients are offered “current standard of care” or enrollment in a clinical trial, to see if something better is out there.
What is the goal of treatment?
In the ideal world we want to cure everybody. But in today’s real world we cannot. So we have to define goals that can be realistically achieved.
I would have liked to hit tennis balls like Federer or Nadal, run marathons, sing like Beyonce, or dance like Michael Jackson, but sadly, I could not. I had to deal with the reality of my limitations.
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