The second largest number of cancer deaths is from colon cancer.. Each year, around forty eight thousand people will pass away from colon cancer. A large number of these deaths might be prevented with early diagnosis and treatment through standard colon cancer screening before symptoms appear.
When the disease is located while it is still a small polyp while undergoing a routine screening test, such as a colonoscopy, the polyp can frequently be taken out in the course of the colonoscopy without the need for the surgical removal of any portion of the colon. Once the polyp grows to the point where it becomes cancerous and gets to Stage I or Stage II, the tumor and a part of the colon on each side is surgical taken out. The likelihood that the individual will survive the cancer is over 90% for Stage I and 73% for Stage II.
If the disease gets to Stage 3, surgery is not enough. The patient will, furthermore, need to have chemotherapy. The relative 5-year survival rate falls to 53%, depending on such factors as the number of lymph nodes that show up positive for cancer.
As soon as the colon cancer gets to the fourth Stage, treatment might necessitate the use of chemotherapy and perhaps additional drugs along with surgery on other organs. If the measurement and quantity of tumors in other organs (such as the liver and lungs) are sufficiently few, surgery to get rid of the cancer from those other organs might be the initial treatment, then chemotherapy. Sometimes the size or quantity of tumors in the different organs eliminates the option of surgery as part of the treatment.
If chemotherapy and different drugs can reduce the quantity and size of these tumors, surgery might then turn out to be an option as the follow up treatment. Otherwise, chemotherapy and different drugs (possibly through clinical trials) may temporarily halt or limit the further spread of the cancer. The relative 5-year survival rate is reduced to roughly 8%.
The statistics are clear. The time frame when the colon cancer is found and treated makes a dramatic difference. If detected and treated early, the individual has an excellent chance of surviving the cancer. When detection and treatment is delayed, the probability starts turning against the individual so that if the colon cancer reaches the lymph nodes, the percentage is almost 50/50. And the likelihood drops greatly when the cancer reaches Stage 4.
However, too frequently physicians do not recommend routine cancer screening to men and women who are asymptomatic. When the cancer is finally detected - often because the tumor has grown so large that it is resulting in blockage, since the person is anemic and it is worsening, or since the individual starts to notice other symptoms - the colon cancer is a Stage 3 or even a Stage 4. The patient now faces a much different outlook than if the cancer had been discovered early by standard screening.
In medical malpractice terms, the person has suffered a "loss of chance" of a better recovery. That is to say, since the doctor did not recommend that the patient have a routine screening test, the cancer is now much more advanced and the patient faces a much lower likelihood of outliving the cancer. A physician may be liable for malpractice if he or she does not recommend cancer screening to a patient who subsequently is determined to have metastatic colon cancer.
Author Resource:-
Joseph Hernandez is an attorney accepting cancer cases. To learn more about advanced colon cancer and stage 4 colon cancer cases visit the website.
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