Pancreatic cancer is one of the most common cancers of the digestive tract, along with stomach cancer and cancer of the colon. In recent years it has been observed that in the western industrialised countries of the world there is an increase in new cases of this tumour disease. Currently, about 10 out of every 100,000 people fall ill every year.
This makes it a disease that occurs quite frequently. The increase in the number of people suffering from pancreatic cancer is primarily to be found in the western industrialised countries and allows conclusions to be drawn about a connection between the lifestyle and diet of people in industrialised countries as opposed to people in developing countries. The majority of people with pancreatic cancer are between 60 and 80 years of age. This is therefore a disease of old age.
Cause
The cause of pancreatic cancer is still not known with certainty. A genetic cause is present in a small proportion of those affected. This means that the disease is hereditary and there is a familial incidence.
General risk factors that increase the likelihood of developing pancreatic cancer are age (this is a very definite risk factor), gender (men are far more frequently affected in this context) and ethnic origin (dark-skinned people have an increased risk). Certain underlying diseases also lead to an increased incidence of the tumour, for example in inherited and chronic pancreatitis, familial incidence of breast cancer or after surgical removal of the stomach. Otherwise, a number of other risk factors are suspected of promoting the development of pancreatic cancer.
These include smoking, diabetes mellitus, overweight, an already existing chronic inflammation of the pancreas and solvents. In almost all patients, the tumour is located in the area of the head of the pancreas, where it accounts for approximately 80% of all cases. A tumour in the area of the pancreas body occurs with a frequency of 10% and the remaining 10% is statically distributed over the occurrence in the area of the pancreas tail.
Chance of survival without surgery
Without surgery, pancreatic cancer is a fatal disease for the person affected within a few months. In most cases, surgery is no longer possible due to the advanced tumor growth in surrounding tissue or metastasis in other organs of the body. At the time of diagnosis, pancreatic cancer is usually already in its final stage.
The tumour is no longer operable. Since this is well known, it is all the more important to examine patients with an increased risk profile at regular intervals in order to have the opportunity to detect the tumour at a stage of spread that still allows it to be removed by surgery, thus improving the chances of survival. For the screening procedure, but also to assess the later surgical situation, an oesophagoscopy and gastroscopy are used, an X-ray of the gastrointestinal tract is taken, a CT image of the abdomen is taken, and an X-ray of the chest is taken to detect any metastases in the lungs.
It is also possible to detect tumour markers in the blood and to check these from time to time for changes. It is called CA19-9 and is used to monitor the course of the disease, but is also used to assess the effect of the therapy. Without surgery, the patient has a medium chance of survival of weeks to months. Apart from surgery, it is also possible to radiate the tumour (radiotherapy) and possibly use a combination of chemotherapy. The use of these procedures increases the average chance of survival by several months.