Showing posts with label Decortication. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Decortication. Show all posts

Tuesday, August 30, 2011

Shelling or Decortication : Mesothelioma Treatment

Mesothelioma is a cancer typically caused by asbestos exposure. Cancer can take several years to become evident, and when present, may be difficult to detect. Patients receiving treatment for early stages of mesothelioma have a better prognosis, but survival is low. Health and the patient's age also affects the prognosis.

Treatment of mesothelioma fall into two main categories, curative and palliative. The cure is a cure for mesothelioma patients to remove or kill cancer cells in the affected area. Palliative treatments are performed to reduce a patient's pain and discomfort and improve quality of life.

There are several methods of treatment of mesothelioma. Surgery can be performed. The most common in patients with pleural mesothelioma is pleurectomy / decortication procedure. This surgery involves removing the lining of the chest where the cancer is packaged.

Less common type of pericardial mesothelioma is surgery performed extrapleural pneumonectomy. This method removed the lungs, the lining of the chest wall, pericardium, and Hemi-diaphragm. The goal is to reduce the cuts in cancer tumors. This will help to expand the patient's life.

For patients in the early stages of mesothelioma, radiotherapy can be performed. Radiation is often done after surgery to kill cancer cells more. HEMI whole breast treated with radiation. Radiation therapy is often performed at the sites of chest tube insertion. This prevents the growth of tumor along the patient's chest wall. Radiation therapy may also be used for the purpose of palliative relief of symptoms of tumor growth.

Chemotherapy is an effective treatment for mesothelioma patients. And 'often performed in addition to radiotherapy. A statistical basis, studies have shown that patients undergoing chemotherapy to extend the life of many months than those who do not receive treatment.

Decortication Mesothelioma: Different Ways To Remedy

Approaches to treatment of malignant mesothelioma consist of curative procedures and practices of palliative care.

As the label suggests, potentially curative procedures, to improve the patients 'disease'. The main objective of these procedures for the complete removal of serious illness. Microscopic residual disease is typically blown out of the use of adjuvant therapy is usually in the form of a combination of chemotherapy and radiotherapy. Studies have shown that the approach trimodality, combining surgery with radiotherapy and chemotherapy or other novel approaches, such as gene therapy, photodynamic therapy, or immunotherapy are effectively come to a cure.

An example of a potentially curative procedure for mesothelioma is pleural pleurectomy or decortication. This is usually done in patients who are in stages I and II malignant mesothelioma. The removal of all gross tumor is attempted this procedure. If complete removal of the tumor requires removal of the lung and pneumonectomy was performed at the same time.

A more radical approach that can potentially be used to treat pleural mesothelioma is an extrapleural pneumonectomy. As this is a more radical, more experience is required of surgeons. Patients must meet certain criteria before extrapleural pneumonectomy can be performed on them. These criteria included a Karnofsky performance score of the State of> 70 years, renal and liver function if in a normal electrocardiogram and the results of an echocardiogram, pulmonary function tests properly, limiting disease in the entire ipsilateral hemithorax or without any involvement of the wall of the diaphragm, heart or chest, and patient age. The age is not given as much weight as the patient's overall functional status.

For peritoneal mesothelioma, a tumor reduction surgery is performed to finally make a recovery. As with the methods used for pleural mesothelioma, this is done to remove all gross tumor. Cytoreductive surgery is usually combined with hyperthermic intraperitoneal chemotherapy (IPHC), which aims to eliminate any remaining microscopic cancer cells.

For patients with advanced stages of malignant mesothelioma of the above approaches to healing are not warranted, treatment should be directed to the use of palliative procedures.

Palliative procedures are designed to relieve symptoms caused by the disease in hopes of improving the quality of life for patients. Thoracic drainage and pleurodesis is a palliative treatment used to relieve joint fluid accumulation or effusion in the chest cavity. Since a malignant pleural effusion is usually persistent, after the initial drainage, pleurodesis is often made to permanently close the pleural space and prevent fluid re-accumulation. Talcum powder or other sclerosing agents are used as glue. Thoracoscopy with pleurodesis have another palliative procedure with a similar strategy. Both procedures can be done if the tumor has not encapsulated lungs. The unlimited capacity for expansion of the lungs must be intact for both procedures. In cases where the disease is limiting the expansion of the lung, a pleurectomy is the most effective treatment means to control the pleural effusion.

Pleuroperitoneal shunt is another palliative procedure, a catheter position, the thread under the skin of the patient's pleural and peritoneal cavities. This is not a very popular option for palliative care due to possible obstruction of the catheter and the seeding of tumor in different cavities.

The choice of treatment options for malignant mesothelioma is depending on the stage of the patient's disease at diagnosis. Rapid recognition of symptoms and diagnosis in a timely manner is still needed before these treatments can be implemented.

Decortication Surgery

Shelling is a medical procedure that involves surgically removing the outer layer, the membrane, or fibrous cover of an organ. The procedure is usually performed when the lung is covered with a thick, inelastic expansion Peel prevent lungs pleural. In a non-medical decortication is the removal of the bark, straw, or the outer layer of an object. It is also used for the treatment of chronic laryngitis.

When you perform a decortication of the lung, which is the most commonly used, the patient is under general anesthesia and the thoracic cavity is divided as it is for an open heart surgery. Studies of surgical areas of pleural membrane (a type of enclosure that surrounds the lungs) to find areas that have fiber and scars, and removes them. The next step is to close the surgical opening and cause the patient to anesthesia. This is a major operation, it is invasive and the patient requires several days of surveillance in a hospital to determine if the patient is healing, as he / she should.

When the pleura is thickened, which usually causes pain and discomfort for the patient. If left pleural thickening more, can lead to problems, such as a difficult patient to breathe. In addition, when the lung is involved can be difficult to swell, can not be pushed out of the way the pleura. Since the patient is fighting a lack of oxygen, this can lead to shortness of breath and other serious medical problems.

Pleural mesothelioma is caused by exposure to asbestos occurs when asbestos fibers trapped in the deadly space between the mesothelial cells. When they are caught in the mesothelium, the fibers will automatically get cancer cells to divide irregularly causing severe thickening of the pleural membrane. This can cause excess fluid called pleural effusion. The liquid then put pressure on the lungs and breathing (respiratory) system to prevent regular breathing.

Pleurectomy is a surgical procedure to remove part of lung disease, the lining of the lungs. This is a type of surgery is performed to treat mesothelioma, a rare species of lung cancer is often associated with exposure to asbestos. The surgeon will remove the pleura, which is an area where most of the malignant tumor is usually found. If the cancer is at a very early stage, doctors believe pleurectomy as a healing remedy potential or treatment. Other patients in more advanced stages of cancer to get some sort of surgery as palliative therapy to relieve symptoms.

Then there is an empyema, or infection of the area of ​​the pleura. They are usually caused by pneumonia in the patient. Many patients who develop pneumonia plural effusion. Normally, pleural effusion cleared up when the pneumonia is treated. Often in other patients without perfusion do not disappear, but become infected. An infusion is known as infected pleural empyema. Empyema generally will not respond to antibiotics, nor do they get by themselves. Most of these infections require a surgical exploration and drainage.