Pancreatic carcinoma (or more precise term in the narrower sense: ductal adenocarcinoma of the pancreas), pancreatic carcinoma, pancreatic cancer, pancreatic tumour English: pancreatic carcinoma
General Information
Pancreatic cancer is one of the most aggressive forms of cancer there is and is understood to be a malignant degeneration of pancreatic cells. Both men and women are equally affected by this serious disease, which occurs primarily between the ages of 50 and 60. You can find more information here: Pancreatic Cancer Age The first symptoms of pancreatic cancer usually appear very late, sometimes only in the final stages and then they are usually unspecific, i.e. not very typical of pancreatic cancer. You can find more information here: Pancreatic cancer signs More and more attempts are being made to find good therapies, but in contrast to many other types of cancer, there are initially hardly any or no symptoms and chemotherapy does not work very well because the tumour does not respond well to it.
Duration of illness
It is not possible to determine the duration of the illness for all those affected. It also depends on when the disease is discovered as such. If it is a very early stage, the disease can be cured by surgery.
However, if it is a late stage or the final stage, the prognosis is unfortunately poor. The average survival time is usually only 1-2 years, depending on how much the body struggles and how well the chemotherapy and radiation therapies work. You can find more information here: Pancreatic cancer prognosis
What does end stage mean?
End-stage pancreatic cancer means a very advanced tumor stage. In most cases, so-called metastases are already present, i.e. tumour cells have settled in other organs, vessels or lymph nodes. However, the final stage can also be a very large, inoperable tumour in the pancreas, which causes many symptoms because its size severely disrupts the function of the other organs.
Symptoms
The problem with pancreatic cancer is often that the symptoms can be very unspecific. In particular, nausea and vomiting are often observed in connection with pancreatic cancer. Only when the symptoms persist for a very long time do the first ones go to the doctor and more detailed examinations such as a computer tomography are carried out.
Unfortunately, the cancer is often already very advanced at this stage. Other symptoms can also be digestive disorders in the form of constipation or diarrhoea, as the pancreas is responsible for the production of various enzymes necessary for digestion in addition to the production of insulin. These enzymes are transported via the pancreatic duct to the digestive tract, where they break down food.
If these digestive enzymes are no longer released into the digestive tract, the food cannot be properly broken down into its individual nutrients. This is also a reason why many patients also lose a lot of their body weight during the course of the disease (also known as “tumour cachexia“). Often affected patients also report that they have lost their appetite and therefore lose weight additionally. The diet for pancreatic cancer should be discussed with the doctor. In addition, enlargement of the pancreas can lead to the duodenum becoming enlarged.
