Finding out you have prostate cancer, or any cancer for that matter, is one of the scariest things that could happen to you in your life. You are suddenly pulled into the world of medicine quite frankly, unless they or a close relative has gone through cancer, no one else can relate. Your world has changed and not a lot of it makes sense. Suddenly, you have to start rearranging the way you eat, the way you sleep, the way you engage in work or school. All that’s tiring in itself and we haven’t even gotten to the treatment part yet!
When you do get to the treatment part, you must be prepare yourself. It’s a lot. Now, you’ve got scientific words being thrown at you left and right. Well, here’s a little help with that. Whether you have prostate cancer, have a loved one with the disease, or are just research to prepare if that dreaded day were ever to come, here’s a list of some treatments that could save your life.
- Teletherapy
Teletherapy is a treatment of prostate cancer that focuses on energy to heal you. What is meant by that is that the energy is targeted at your cancer in order to shrink and eliminate the tumor. More specifically, this energy takes the form of x-rays or other energy beams. This is again targeted at the tumor inside you to shrink it and stop the cancer from spreading. - Brachytherapy
Another form of prostate cancer treatment is brachytheraphy. Now this may sound extreme at first, but it is tested and multiple doctors approve of this method. When enacting brachytherapy what is happening is that radioactive material is being used to treat the cancer. That part of the cancer treatment therapy is nothing new. (In fact, radiation therapy will be talked about later on in this list). What’s noteworthy for this particular therapy is that it involves the insertion of radioactive material directly into the body. That’s right, radioactive material goes inside the body to treat cancer. Again, this is well tested and is a perfectly viable option for if you are in need of prostate cancer treatment. - Proton Therapy
Next, we have proton therapy. As you can see, a lot of these therapies intersect in their execution. Proton therapy is similar to teletherapy in the fact that it uses a beam to treat the cancer. In addition, it’s similar to particle therapy because the things being pumped into the body are charged particles.
This time however the source being used is in fact protons. Proton therapy for cancer is a viable option, just like the others, in order to irradiate the tumor. While proton therapy can be used for other illnesses and diseases such as pediatric neoplasms, it is most common to use proton therapy for prostate cancer. This ultimately means that using proton therapy is a thorough and well proven option for prostate cancer treatment. - Particle Therapy
While Proton therapy is a subsection of particle therapy, particle therapy is in fact the parent treatment. It is the defined as the use of a beam of particles, like the protons in the last example, to treat cancer. Again, proton therapy is the most common form of particle therapy. That said, there are other treatments that involve neutrons and positive ions. - Radiation Therapy
The last therapy on this list is radiation therapy. As mentioned above, this therapy is a lot like many of the others yet has a subtle difference. The way that radiation therapy works is that high-energy beams of radiation are sent through the body in an effort to shrink and kill tumors. Just like with particle therapy, charged particles are one source of radiation that can be charged into the body. Others include x-rays and gamma rays. These rays are used to damage the DNA of the cells make them incapable of growing throughout your body.
Any kind of cancer, whether it is prostate cancer, breast cancer or whatever else, is scary. That said, with the proper tools and knowledge, tackling that beast can be possible. Spend more time researching different kinds of prostate cancer treatment or practices for the type of cancer you have. Learn today to prepare for tomorrow. Then, fight your hardest.