Recently, cases of the spread of a disease such as bowel cancer, whose symptoms do not appear for a long period of time, are increasingly observed. Bowel cancer is a group of tumors that form in the colon or rectum from their epithelium, and occurs most often in men over the age of forty.
The reasons for the development of cancerous tumors in the intestine have not been studied to date, it is assumed that there are some factors that provoke the appearance of cancer. These factors include:
1. Heredity. In medicine, cases of bowel cancer and diffuse polyposis of several family members are known. Moreover, polyposis is characterized by the formation of many benign tumors that degenerate into cancer due to inherited genetic mutations.
2. Chronic inflammatory processes in the body. This includes diseases such as ulcerative colitis, proctitis, Crohn's disease, anal fissures.
3. Wrong diet. With an overabundance of fatty, meaty and fiber-rich food and a lack of vegetables and cereals in the diet, as well as a sedentary lifestyle, the risk of developing a cancerous disease increases.
4. Excessive smoking and alcoholism. These factors most often cause chronic diseases of the gastrointestinal tract, which can develop into cancer.
It is generally accepted that bowel cancer does not exhibit symptoms for a long period of time, but often there may be blood in the stool, constipation, or diarrhea. If these symptoms do not disappear for more than two weeks, you must contact a medical institution for an examination, since this disease in the early stages is almost always treatable.
Other bowel cancer symptoms include bloating, pain or discomfort in the anus, nausea or vomiting. Although these symptoms are rare, it is worth paying attention to when diagnosing the disease. If the disease is at the last stages of its development, a person may experience persistent abdominal pain, inflammation of the bladder, which gradually spreads to the ureters and kidneys, and urination during defecation.
Depending on how far the disease has spread, it is customary to distinguish four stages of bowel cancer:
1. 0 stage - a cancerous tumor of small sizes, it does not spread to other organs and tissues.
2. I stage. The tumor spreads through the intestines, not reaching the muscle layer.
3. II stage. A cancerous tumor spreads to the inner, muscle and outer layers of the intestine.
4. III stage. A malignant tumor from the intestine spreads to the lymph nodes located nearby. We can say that intestinal cancer, stage 3 of its development, is characterized by an increase in lymph nodes, while the survival rate is 50%.
5. IV stage. The tumor spreads to other organs and tissues of the body. Most often, metastases are observed in the liver, lungs and ovaries. Thus, intestinal cancer, stage 4 of its development, in particular, is characterized by a low survival rate, only 1% of people continue to live for five years, in all other cases a fatal outcome is observed.
Diagnosis of intestinal cancer is carried out using colonoscopy, sigmoidoscopy, irrigoscopy, fibrocolonoscopy, as well as studies of fecal analyzes.
Thus, bowel cancer, the symptoms of which are described above, treatment involves the surgical method and the method of radio and chemotherapy. With immediate treatment in the early stages of the disease, it is possible to achieve a complete cure of the disease.