Home | Health | Cancer | Lung Cancer Treatment | Asbestos Lung Cancer Treatment

Asbestos Lung Cancer Treatment

by Melissa Lind

Overview

Long term asbestos exposure has been shown to cause several types of asbestos related lung cancers. Asbestos lung cancer can be treated with traditional modalities including radiation therapy, surgery and chemotherapy. New treatments are also offering promise and hope for increased quality and longevity of life in patients faced with asbestos lung cancer treatment.
About

Asbestos was used for many years in manufacturing, mining, mills and shipbuilding. Some may have been exposed because it was widely used in building materials such as insulation and floor tiling. Long term asbestos exposure has been proven to contribute to such diseases as asbestosis and several varieties of cancer including small cell lung cancer, non-small cell lung cancer and malignant pleural mesothelioma. As the prognosis for any type of asbestos lung cancer is often quite poor, a multi modal treatment regimen will generally be used by combining two or more of the available options.

Radiation

Radiation therapy or radiotherapy involves targeting high energy particles on tumor tissue to reduce or eliminate a cancer and may be used alone or in combination with other treatments. Intensity Modulated Radiation Therapy (IMRT) involves the use of a graphic map to focus radiation particles on the tumor tissue without involving healthy surrounding tissue. The newer Tomotherapy, uses advanced technology similar to the CT scan to deliver precise amounts of radiation to the tumor tissue in a layer by layer fashion. Brachytherapy is the surgical placement of radioactive beads or rods at the tumor site. Side effects of any type of radiation include nausea and vomiting, fatigue and depressed immune function along with possible hair loss.
Surgery

There are several different types of surgery for asbestos lung cancer treatment, depending upon the stage and location of the cancer. Some types of surgery are merely palliative, used to reduce symptoms and increase lung functioning such as pleural drainage used to remove fluid that has built up in the space surrounding the lungs and pleurodesis which is the deliberate fusing of the lining surrounding the lung to eliminate further fluid buildup. Other lung cancer surgical procedures are meant to be curative by the removal of all of the tumor tissue. Pneumonectomy is the removal of tumor tissue in the lungs and is a very serious medical procedure which may require removal of one or more lobes. More severe cases may require removal of the entire lung. Surgery will most often be combined with radiation and/or chemotherapy.
Chemotherapy

Chemotherapy is used both alone to shrink and eliminate tumor tissue and with other therapies to eliminate the possibility of microscopic tumor tissue left behind from surgery or radiation. Even one surviving tumor cell may produce new tumor tissue or metastasize or migrate to another area of the body to create a new tumor in a different location. Well known side effects of chemotherapy include nausea and vomiting, hair loss, immune suppression and others specific to each type of chemotherapy such as organ damage.
New Treatments

New treatments for asbestos lung cancer include photodynamic therapy which uses laser light particles focused to destroy tumor tissue and a number of immunologic and targeted therapies designed to use the body's own immune system to recognize and destroy cancer tissue as foreign material.