Before I look into fashion and cancer I want to research Cancer as a whole. If I’m going to use Cancer in my final major project then I want to know everything about it, I’m going to look into what Cancer is, What treatments are on offer and what are the side effects and what Charites/ organizations are available.
What is Cancer?
Cancer is the name given to a collection of related diseases. In all types of cancer, some of the body’s cells begin to divide without stopping and spread into surrounding tissues. Cancer can start almost anywhere in the human body, which is made up of trillions of cells.
What treatments are on offer?
There are a number of treatments on offer for people who are diagnosed with cancer. Before treatment is offered doctors take a number of things into consideration, first, they look at what kind of Cancer it is if it’s in one place they could offer surgery as an option but if the cancer is no contained somewhere in the body they won’t as cancer is highly contagious in the body meaning if it reaches the bloodstream it would be transported all over the body. They also look at how far the cancer is. Cancer is put into four stages;
- stage 0 which means the cancer is located in one place and hasn’t started to spread to any nearby tissue.
- Stage 1 which is small cancer or a tumour that has not grown deeply into nearby tissues.
- Stage 2 and 3 which means there are larger cancers or tumours that have grown more deeply into the nearby tissue.
- Stage 4 at this stage cancer has spread to other organs or parts of the body and is terminal.
The treatments on offer to people going through Cancer are
- Surgery
- Radiation
- Hormone Therapy
- Chemotherapy
- Targeted Therapy
- Palliative Care
Sometimes people have more than one treatment for one cancer such as a combination of Radiation and Chemotherapy.
What are the side effects from treatment?
There are a number of different side effects from these treatments, and every person varies so one person may get really bad side effects or some people get no side effects. The most common side effects from Cancer treatments are;
- Anaemia
- Appetite loss
- Bleeding
- Bruising
- Constipation
- Fatigue
- Hair loss
- Mouth ulcers
- Mouth and Throat problems
- Nausea
- Vomiting
- Pain
- Skin and nail changes
- Sleep problems
- Some peoples body’s struggle to regulate temperature
Cancer charities/organizations
Cancer affects almost everyone with 359,960 cases of cancer recorded in the Uk in 2015, and over 163,444 people died from Cancer in 2016. Every two minutes someone in the UK are diagnosed with Cancer, and cancer also accounts for more than 28% of all deaths in the UK in 2016. Out of the treatment options, 45% of people go down the surgery route, 27% have radiotherapy and 28% have chemotherapy. Because Cancer is such a huge killer in the UK a number of different charities have been set up to help defeat cancer the most popular is cancer research, Teenage Cancer Trust, Treckstock. A lot of these charities are aimed at a particular group of people or cancer such as Breast Cancer Now and Teenage Cancer Trust. They have also created ribbons that are different colours/ designs that represent the different Cancer’s. There are also a lot of help groups that have been set up to help people who are going through cancer such as Macmillian and Marie Curie.
