There are three main types of blood cancer i.e. leukemia, myeloma and lymphoma, which are neoplastic diseases originating from the bone marrow or lymphatic body tissue. They are characterized by producing white blood cells and result in affecting how the body provides protection from new disease. Luckily the successful radiation and chemotherapy treatments have tremendously increased survival rates for sufferers.
Basic info
Leukemia is a term that was first introduced by Rudolf Virchow ? a German doctor and biologist in the19th century. Leukemia quite literally means white blood (from the Greek leukos and haemia). It?s a disease common to all age groups ? from infants to older people. It?s the most often diagnosed child cancer. Leukemias are divided in two groups ? acute and chronic. Then even acute ones itself is broken down to lymphoblastic and myelogenous, while the chronic ones are lymphocytic and myelogenous. Most common in small children is the acute lymphoblastic leukemia.
Symptoms
Similar to all blood cell the leukemia cells also circulate throughout the entire body. People with chronic leukemia do not have symptoms, although the doctor can discover the disease during a routine blood test.
People with acute leukemia usually consult with their doctor because they are feeling unwell. If the brain is damaged in any way they will suffer headaches, vomiting, loss of muscle control and seizures. Leukemia can harm other parts of the body also, such the lung, kidney and testicles. Symptoms include:
- swollen lymph nodes
- fever and night sweats
- often infections
- feeling of weakness and fatigue
- loss of weight due to unknown reasons
- pain in the bones and joints
Treatment
People with blood cancer have many possible methods of medication ? chemotherapy, biological therapy, radio therapy and transplantation of stem cells. If the spleen has increased in size your doctor may offer surgery to remove it.
The choice of treatment depends on certain factors:
- leukemia type
- the age of the patient
- is there leukemia cells in the cerebrospinal fluid
- patient?s overall health
Procedure
People with acute leukemia must start treatment immediately. The aim is to destroy signs of leukemia in the organism. This is called remission. After someone is in remission they start a maintenance therapy. Most people with acute leukemia can be cured completely.
Advances
If you have chronic leukemia without symptoms you can?t start treatment immediately. Your doctor must watch your health closely and then arrange treatment to start when the symptoms appear. When you reach the stage that you need treatment, the disease can then be controlled and you may receive maintenance therapy to stay in remission. However, the only way to completely cure chronic leukemia is with chemotherapy.
Over the last few years treatment with stem cells has advanced and the transplantation of these cells is often employed. For the transplant a stem cell donor is required ? whether someone can donate to someone else is determined by the antigens on the surface of his white blood cells. But the problem is that there are many different combinations of antigens and the result is that the chance of donor and recipient matching is around 0,01%. For this very reason the first search for a donor is if you have brothers and sisters -and even then the chance of a match is a mere 25%. If there is no match, a non-related donor can provide cells for transplantation.
Source: http://www.drug-cancer.com/blood-cancer-treatment/720107/
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