Lung Cancer Treatment on the Gulf Coast

Lung cancer is the most common cancer in the world and almost 225,000 Americans will be diagnosed with it every year. This means that millions of Americans will suffer from lung cancer. Infirmary Cancer Care brings a commitment to the highest quality cancer care on the Gulf Coast to our treatment. With a caring and motivated team, our goal is to ensure that you get the treatment you need to be cancer-free. From diagnosis through treatment, our team will use the best and most advanced treatments and help you through the treatment process.

Contact our specialists today to schedule an appointment and start your fight against lung cancer.

Symptoms & Risks

Lung cancer involves the uncontrollable growth of cancer cells in the lungs. A problem with lung cancer is that symptoms do not usually manifest themselves until cancer has moved to an advanced stage. Symptoms of lung cancer can include:

• Incurable coughing
• Blood in phlegm
• Facial or neck vein swelling
• Fatigue
• Weight loss and loss of appetite
• Shortness of breath
• Achiness or pain in the chest, upper back or shoulders especially when taking deep breathes

There are certain risk factors for developing the disease. The greatest risk factor for getting lung cancer is being a smoker. Other risk factors include radon exposure, air pollution, asbestos, a family history of lung cancer and being older than 65. While men are more likely to get the disease than women, lung cancer is also the leading cause of cancer deaths for women and black men are more likely to develop the disease than their white counterparts.

Diagnosing Lung Cancer

Physicians will use one of several different tests to determine whether you have lung cancer and if you do, what type of lung cancer you have. This will have bearing on what treatments are available to you. Common ways of diagnosing lung cancer include physical exams, laboratory testing and imaging with X-rays or CT scans to look for cancer. MRIs and PET scans can also be used to check for cancer cells within the body. Other ways to diagnose lung cancer are pulmonary function tests, endoscopic ultrasounds and mediastinoscopy. These tests look at the functions of the lungs as well as the lungs and organs around them to check for cancer more closely.

The two types of lung cancer diagnosed are non-small cell lung cancer and small cell lung cancer. Non-small cell lung cancer accounts for the majority of lung cancer and usually arises from smoking or other exposure to toxins. Small cell lung cancer is a small minority of lung cancer but usually is extremely aggressive and grows quite rapidly.

The American Cancer Society has provided excellent resources on the staging of these two types of cancers:

• Non-small cell lung cancer
• Small cell lung cancer

Those who are at risk of lung cancer should get screened using low-dose CT scans regularly.

Treatment Options

Treatment options will differ for every person depending on their health history and the type and severity of the lung cancer. Some of the treatments available include:

• Surgery
• Chemotherapy
• Radiation
• Targeted therapy
• Immunotherapy
• Clinical trials

Surgery is used to attack the cancer and can be used to remove the cancerous section of the lung or possibly one whole lung. Either in place of or after surgery, radiation and chemotherapy are often used to reduce tumors and eradicate cancer cells in the lungs. Immunotherapy, which activates the patient's immune system to recognize and attack the cancer cells, can also be used to great effect. Also, new targeted therapy treatments are being developed that use some of the genetic makeup of the cancer to target and kill cancer cells. Other treatments include laser therapy, photodynamic therapy and cryotherapy. Your doctor will work with a team of specialists to determine what treatment will work the best.

Call (251) 435-2273 today for more information on how we can treat you.