I know there’s a reason, but I don’t know what it is.
In: Biology
You can, right, I mean that’s one reason for amputations, just cut the part off(unless it’s a vital organ that it)
A lot of tumours ARE surgically removed. But there’s several big issues with that.
Surgery may leave small, microscopic pieces behind that could grow back.
Cancers spread, so a tumour may have already sent out metastatic cells to other parts of the body.
Most of your organs are necessary for you to live and there may be no way to remove a tumour without removing all or most of the organ.
Tumours may be in a surgically inaccessible area, ie the deep interior of the brain or on the brain stem, or inside the bone marrow (leukemia)
You can, and it is done way more than you think. The most recent story I heard was from a new coworker who had 18 inches of his lower colon removed due to extensive prostate cancer. He’s fine now. A lot of skin melanomas are just cut, frozen, or lasered off. Breast cancers are often cut out. The problem is they often return, or spread to other parts of your body, including your lymphatic system.
You can, but cancer cells can break off the tumor and spread throughout the body. Even if you cut out the main tumor, there may be cancer elsewhere and a new tumor will grow. This is why early detection is so important. You want to cut out the tumor before it spreads.
Cutting out a tumor is something doctors can try to do but in only works in specific circumstances. Many types of tumors can communicate with the body and request blood vessels be built to them and consume resources meant for other organs. In addition, they grow virulently and can grow around critical blood vessels and organs making it essentially impossible to cut out the entire tumor without risking killing the patient. Sometimes the tumors can grow and kill off the cells that form the walls of organs complicating the removal process. If even a single cancerous cell is left behind and not destroyed by the body – it can grow back into another tumor, so it can carry many risks.
Lastly, the most dangerous types of cancer are tumors that actively spread freely throughout the body. Cells can break off and float throughout the body and embed themselves elsewhere growing new masses simultaneously everywhere in the body. At this stage the tumors are likely inoperable – the only way to fight them is chemically or via other means.
You can but, if the cancer is malignant, it won’t stop the out-of-control growth cycle that caused them to form in the first place
You can. It’s just often not the only form of treatment (was step 2/3 for me)
If you’re lucky, they get all of it (negative margins). A positive margin indicates they couldn’t get all of the cancer cells.
And they’re getting better and better at it. My surgery was in 2019, surgeon said 30 years ago, they would have just taken my leg. So I’m thankful for the improvement.
Part of it is surgical shock that comes at a risk, while the ‘reward’ of such a surgery may involve not even getting rid of it, allowing it to grow back again.. I believe it’s similar to mold, since cancer can be as small as a single cell, what is seen may not be all there is.
Think of a tumor like a giant scab covering a wound that you can tell has healed but is still stuck on. You can’t just tear it off, you’ll open the wound and will bleed a lot, so instead what you do is wipe on some hydrogen peroxide (chemo/radiation or similar treatment) to slowly dissolve the edges and soften it up. You continue to do this over and over until you can carefully remove the entire thing without damaging the surrounding area. Then apply a little more in order to clean up the area and make sure there isn’t any scab you missed that could cause problems later.
Surgically cutting out cancer is routinely done. This is more common and effective for certain types of cancers, may not work for all cancer, but your question of “why can it not be done” is not true.
Common examples include surgically removing the breasts to remove breast cancer, or cutting out a section of the colon/intestines for colon cancer.
Once the cancer has metastasized throughout your body, leading to numerous tumours everywhere all over the body, then surgical removing of so many tumours becomes impossible.
Certain types of cancer may also carry high risk of side effects for surgery – such as having to remove a large section of a vital organ, or located in an area that’s difficult to access. So surgery is less desirable in these types of cancers and other treatments will be better.
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