Pancreatic Cancer Symptoms

What is Pancreatic Cancer?

Pancreatic cancer is a disease in which a tumor develops within pancreas. Pancreas is one of the organs in upper abdomen. It is located under the stomach and next to the first part of the small intestine, which is called as duodenum. Pancreas is the collection of glands and performs variety of tasks. Pancreas' functions are classified into two categories. These categories are:

Exocrine: These are the glands that secrets the enzymes into the ducts and ultimately empty in the duodenum. These enzymes are useful for digestion of food, which moves through intestine.
Endocrine: These glands secrete the hormones with insulin in the bloodstream. Insulin is carried out in whole body with the help of blood. Level of the sugar is controlled by insulin.

The pancreas can be divided into four anatomical sections. These sections are as follows:

Head - The rightmost portion that placed next to the duodenum
Body - The middle portion of pancreas
Uncinate process - An extension of the head of the pancreas
Tail - The left most portion of pancreas that placed next to the spleen

IPMN (Intraductal Papillary Mucinous Neoplasia) is a kind of pancreatic cancer. This type of cancer is predicted more easily than the other types of pancreatic cancer. Intraductal papillary mucinous neoplasia is usually diagnosed with the help of endoscopically.

The common type of the pancreatic cancer arises because of exocrine glands, which is known as adenocarcinoma of pancreas. The pancreatic cancer is the result of endocrine glands, referred as neuroendocrine carcinoma or the islet cell tumor.

Pancreatic adenocarcinoma can be considered as one of the most aggressive types of cancer. Because mostly at the time pancreatic cancer is diagnosed; it is already spread in many parts of the body. However, medications can relatively resist pancreatic cancer, but surgery is proved treatment to cure pancreatic cancer. About 31, 800 people of United States are found with pancreatic cancer in the year of 2004, and out of which 31,200 are victimized to death from the same disease.

Causes of Pancreatic Cancer

There are some major causes of pancreatic cancer. Some of the aspects responsible for pancreatic cancer are given below:

Advanced age
Smoking
Male sex - The pancreatic ratio of male-to-female is 1.3:1.
Diabetes mellitus
Chronic pancreatitis - Inflammation of the pancreas occurs because of excessive drinking of alcohol or the gallstones
Family history about the pancreatic cancer

Pancreatic Cancer Symptoms

Following are the main symptoms of pancreatic cancer:

Pain in back or abdomen, or both
Weight loss, normally associated with the following:
- Loss of appetite known as anorexia
- Diarrhea or the fatty bowel movements that float in water known as steatorrhea
- Bloating
- Rarely present with new diabetes in person with the nausea or loss of weight
Jaundice in which skin becomes yellow

Generally, most of the pancreatic cancer symptoms are vague. These symptoms are almost similar to other minor diseases. Hence, pancreatic cancer is discovered when it is at the advanced stage.

Diagnosing Pancreatic Cancer

Pancreatic cancer is tested or diagnosed though several ways. These tests are performed to detect whether any abnormalities has occurred in the patient's body. Doctors may recommend one or more than one of the following tests:

Ultrasound: Sound waves of high frequency are used for creating the images of internal organs containing pancreas. For obtaining images, transducer is placed on upper abdomen. This test is helpful to detect gallstones, which has symptoms like pancreatic cancer.
Computerized Tomography (CT): In this test x-ray is taken of the internal organs. Sometimes dye injection is given in arms or legs which highlight the areas. CT scan is successful to locate those small tumors developed within pancreas, which are not detected by ultrasound.
Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI): This test includes radio waves and magnetic field that creates the image of magnetic field.
Endoscopic Retrograde Cholangiopancreatography (ERCP): For highlight the bile ducts, dye is used. In this case, flexible, thin tube is passed into the throat through stomach into the small intestine.
Endoscopic Ultrasound (EUS): Ultrasound device is used in this test for making the images of internal organs that is pancreas. This device is passed into the stomach for obtaining the images.
Percutaneous Transhepatic Cholangiography (PTC): For highlighting the bile ducts, dye is injected in to the liver. Doctor inserts a thin needle in to the needle and dye is injected into the bile duct. The fluoroscope, which is x-special type of x-ray machine that catches the tracks on which dye moves.
Biopsy: For the examination, doctor takes sample of the tissues from the pancreas. This sample can be obtained by inserting needle into the pancreas through the skin. It is also done using endoscopic ultrasound that guides to the special tools where cells can be obtained for the testing.

Treatment for Pancreatic Cancer

Treatment for the pancreatic cancer depends on the extent of the disease. This extent depends on following three categories:

Localized: The cancer is completely confined within the pancreas.
Metastatic: The cancer has spread outside the pancreas to other parts of the body.
Locally advanced: The cancer has extended from the pancreas to involve nearby blood vessels or organs.

Medical Treatment

On the basis of results of chemotherapy, surgery with radiation therapy or without the radiation therapy reduces the chances of reoccurring of the cancer. Following factors are responsible for returning the cancer even after surgical renovation:

Tumor present at the edge of the surgical specimen (referred to as a positive margin)
Tumor tracking along nerves
Tumor present within blood vessels or lymph channels
Surrounding lymph nodes containing cancer

Following two options are available for adjuvant therapy:

Chemotherapy
Simultaneous operation of Chemotherapy and radiation therapy

When pancreatic cancer can not be removed surgically, combination of radiation therapy and chemotherapy is used in that case. Here, only chemotherapy may be used in some of the cases. These treatments' leftovers are contentious, and different centers have different recommendations that based on the many factors such as pancreatic cancer symptoms, and size and extent of the disease.

However, chemotherapy is the Keystone treatment for pancreatic cancer, which is locally metastatic or advanced. The chemotherapy agents mostly used in this gemcitabine condition. If the tumor grows even after chemotherapy treatment, some other methods of treatment should be considered.

Here are some lnks for more details about pancreatic cancer: