Mesothelioma treatment is based on several factors, including the stage of infection, the area of infection, how much the contamination has spread, the nature of the affected cells and the age and overall health of the infected person. Infected persons are usually briefed about the success rates before embarking on any treatment process.
Mesothelioma treatment methods are wide and varied. The common ones practiced are surgery, radiation and medication. Removal of cancer cells are done through surgery whereas use of powerful drugs is involved in medication or chemotherapy. Malicious cells of cancer are destroyed using high energy x-rays or other energy beams in the process of radiation. As the case demands, physicians sometimes use a combination of two or more of these techniques.
Blood tests are not highly successful in analyzing the kind of cancer, whereas procedures like thorascocopy, video assisted thoracic surgery, mediastinoscopy and laproscopy are used to identify the problem. The actual mesothelioma treatment will begin after proper diagnosis.
For patients with comparatively mild infection, surgeries for removal of the cancer from its roots are resorted to. Palliative surgical procedures like chest tube drainage and pleurodesis, thoracoscopy and pleurodesis, pleuroperitoneal shunt and pleurectomy treats the symptoms of the disease rather than the cancer itself. Chest tube drainage and pleurodesis is the most common palliative treatment, which removes the pleural effusion from the affected areas.
In order to eradicate the disease completely strong treatment procedures are undertaken. Decortication is the procedure used to remove tumor from patients without removing the lung. This is done in stage 1 and stage 2 patients. Pneumonectomy is the procedure for removing the tumor, by extracting the lung. These two procedures are done in pleural mesothelioma cases, which account for more than three-fourths of total cases. Surgery will be conducted only after appropriate tests and analysis.
Chemotherapy helps to cease the spread of cancer, to shrink tumors and get rid of the remnants of the disease after the surgery. Here chemicals are used to fight cancer and they prevent the cancerous cells from multiplying. Palliative chemotherapy is used where there are no hopes of survival. Radiotherapy makes use of penetrating beams of extreme energy or particle streams. Thus mesothelioma treatment is a many-sided tactic meant to lessen the anguish of the patients and eradicate the cancer.