Know More About Lung Cancer

Good morning, I am Dr Dinesh Singh I am the director of radiation oncology at Max hospital Vaishali. Today we are going to discuss about the lung cancer, what is lung cancer, how it happens and what a person should do when a lung cancer is diagnosed. Lung cancer is cancer which is developing in the lungs or into the channels of the respiration in the lungs. Majority of patients who have lung cancer they are smokers or alcoholics or then 80 to 90% of them and what happens the tobacco smoke it contains carcinogenic, which promotes cancer. Now it is like we are living in Delhi, Delhi is one of the most polluted cities in the world and the pollution it acts on to the damage which is done by the smoking and the alcohol. So one should totally abstain from the smoking either active or passive smoking, passive smoking is when someone else is smoking sitting with us in the same environment, in the same room, in the same vehicle or into the same compartment so that has to be avoided in totality. The commonest symptom of the lung cancer is a cough, normal khansi jo hoti hai, the patient starts coughing and it doesn't go away even after 2 to 3 weeks have passed. So any a cough which is persisting for more than 2 to 3 weeks it has to be investigated, the first investigation is chest X-Ray and if you suspect on that you can go for CT Scan of the chest or we go for a Bronchoscopic evaluation. When we see that there is an audio or there is an abnormality we have to go for a biopsy of that region either endobronchealy, bronchoscopically or CT guided biopsy is done and after that, once we confirm that it is lung cancer. Next step is to find out where all it has spread for that we do various investigation like PET-CT Scan is one investigation in which we examine from head to toe the entire body is screened and it will tell us which all areas cancer might have spread or we can go for CT Scan of the Thorax, abdomen and the neck to find out, if lung cancer is localised, if it is in the early stage to get operated then we have to go for surgery of the lung cancer and those patients of lung cancer who are able to undergo surgery they are in the curable stage. Another alternative treatment which has been tried and proved is giving a stereotactic radiotherapy to these patients. There was a study done in America which are shown that this stereotactic radiation in the same result as the operation or this surgery of the lung. In little-advanced stages we have to go for radiotherapy along with current chemotherapy this statement last for above 4 to 6 weeks and give good results and in those patients get cancer has spread even beyond that, those patients we go for chemotherapy treatment and if cancer has spread to the brain or to the bones then in these cases we go for radiotherapy of the patient. So I would say we have to avoid smoking and alcohol in totality, we have to do our bit to control pollution in our city, in our surroundings whenever you see any person burning leaves or any garbage we have to go and stop that person, we have to douse the fire and control that pollution so that we are able to contribute, diesel vehicles are polluting we should try to avoid using diesel vehicles and especially young children, school going they are very vulnerable for the diesel exhaust of the vehicles, they should be protected and when we get any symptoms like a cough or any other problem in those cases we have to take proper care proper investigation and proper treatment. Thank you.