Oncologists around the world recommend chemotherapy to patients as an effective cancer treatment. However, patients are concerned about the use of chemotherapy drugs and the associated side effects, regardless of how effective the treatment is for them.
Cancer is a life-threatening disease and the mere thought that it can be diagnosed terribly shakes a person, not to mention the patients who actually have cancer.
Timely diagnosis of cancer is the key to effective cancer treatment, which is most often carried out through chemotherapy, surgery, radiation or targeted drug therapy.
Read to the end to get the most useful information.
Suspected side effects of chemotherapy
Like any medicine, chemotherapy drugs have side effects. However, it is important to understand here that not all patients experience them.
Indeed, chemotherapy can damage healthy cells in the body, such as hair follicles, bone marrow cells, the reproductive system, the digestive tract, or the mouth. But the effect of chemotherapy drugs on these cells depends on the type of drug used and the intensity of the treatment.
Below are some of the common side effects of chemotherapy:
• fatigue,
• fluctuation in weight,
• change in libido,
• diarrhea and constipation,
• mood swings,
• changes in appetite,
• anemia,
• bruising.
As you can see, the side effects of chemotherapy are not as bad as they might seem, and more on this below.
Is chemotherapy really dangerous?
In fact, chemotherapy is completely harmless. The correct use of chemotherapy drugs leads to the destruction of cancer cells, thereby relieving patients of the symptoms they are experiencing.
Oncologists are usually proactive in dealing with the side effects of chemotherapy. To do this, they use several strategies to control or prevent their manifestation in patients after treatment.
Despite this, patients still sometimes experience side effects of chemotherapy. They only occur when drugs aimed at destroying cancer cells are simultaneously affect rapidly growing healthy cells such as hair follicles, leading to hair loss hair.
But this is only half the truth. For facts surrounding some of the common myths and misconceptions about chemotherapy, read the section below.
Common myths and misconceptions about chemotherapy
1. Every cancer patient undergoing chemotherapy experiences complete hair loss
This is a completely false fact that people tend to believe. Not all chemotherapy drugs cause hair loss in patients, as different drugs have separate mechanisms to inhibit tumor cell proliferation. There are only a few medications that can cause only partial, but never complete, hair loss.
Currently, oncologists prefer to use specific targeted drugs as chemotherapy drugs. These drugs are modified to target cancer cells while retaining all other types of rapidly dividing cells in the body.
In addition, oncologists identify patients who may experience hair loss. Such patients are advised to cool their scalp after chemotherapy. This procedure restricts blood flow to the scalp for several hours. As a result, it is less likely that the hair follicles will be exposed to chemotherapy drugs passing through the blood.
2. Both men and women are unable to reproduce after chemotherapy
This is one of the worst delusions still believed in. Gone are the days when people lost fertility due to chemotherapy. New advances in medical technology now enable patients to successfully conceive after treatment.
Oncologists make every effort to preserve the patient's fertility during chemotherapy. For women at high risk, an oncologist may prescribe medications before chemotherapy drugs to suppress ovarian function.
In other cases, men and women can freeze their sex cells in a cryobank before chemotherapy. But this is not necessary in all cases. Most patients are able to reproduce naturally after the end of treatment.
3. Chemotherapy can be avoided as there are many other advanced cancer treatments
It is true that there are many other cancer treatment options out there, but nothing works like chemotherapy. Chemotherapy either kills cancer cells or stops them from growing further. There is no other form of treatment that follows the same principle.
4. An oncologist advises chemotherapy only for severe cancers.
This is completely wrong. The reason for using chemotherapy drugs varies from one patient to another. In some patients, chemotherapy is used as a stand-alone cancer treatment, while in others it is used in combination with radiation therapy. But this does not mean that the stage or grade of the cancer is severe in both cases, which is why chemotherapy is used.
For example, brain chemotherapy is usually given when the patient is scheduled for surgery to remove the cancer. Oncologists give brain chemotherapy to shrink the tumor before surgery. This makes it easier for oncologist surgeons to remove the entire tumor in one go during surgery.
5. Nausea and vomiting are the two main side effects of chemotherapy
General malaise in the form of nausea and vomiting were once the leading side effects of chemotherapy. However, the situation has changed significantly over the past few years. Patients are now prescribed several medications just before chemotherapy to suppress nausea and vomiting.
6. Chemotherapy drugs are given intravenously, which requires a hospital stay
Intravenous infusion is just one way to administer chemotherapy drugs. Not all medications require the patient to remain in the hospital for an intravenous infusion.
Most chemotherapy drugs are now taken orally, either in the hospital or at home. Some of them are applied topically or injected intramuscularly. Therefore, in such cases, the patient does not need to stay in the hospital. Even in the case of intravenous infusion, patients are currently discharged the same day after the successful administration of chemotherapy drugs.
7. The cost of chemotherapy is the same for all types of cancer
Not all chemotherapy drugs cost the same. The cost of chemotherapy differs from country to country and even from city to city.
For example, the cost of chemotherapy treatment in India is much cheaper than in any other western country, including the US and UK. This is because most of the chemotherapy drugs are produced in India itself, and those that are not produced in that country are imported at a very reasonable price.
In addition, the cost of chemotherapy also depends on the type of drug used. Some drugs are more expensive than others and therefore vary in price. For example, chemotherapy for the brain is orders of magnitude more expensive than chemotherapy for skin cancer due to the use of a different set of drugs.
8. Immunotherapy is safer and more effective than chemotherapy
Immunotherapy is a treatment that patients look forward to instead of chemotherapy. But both of these treatments have completely different mechanisms of action. The former uses the patient's immune system to kill cancer cells, while the latter directly kills cancer cells.
For the same reason, immunotherapy is not so popular, since it depends entirely on the ability of the patient's immunity to fight cancer cells. Even clinical studies have not yet confirmed the effectiveness of immunotherapy for the treatment of all forms of cancer.
On the other hand, chemotherapy has been in use for decades. It is successful in treating cancer and its importance cannot be negated by any other alternative therapies, be it immunotherapy or anything else.
