Pancreatic Cancer – An Introduction
Pancreas is located in the abdomen. Pancreas secretes one of the important hormones of the body, Insulin. Pancreas, in addition to secreting insulin, also secretes other hormones like glucagon and somatostatin. Insulin along with glucagon is responsible for maintenance of blood glucose levels in the body. Insulin reduces the blood glucose levels and facilitates the utilization of glucose by cells. glucagon increases the blood glucose levels when the blood glucose levels fall. Pancreas also secretes the digestive juice which contains various enzymes which facilitate breakdown and absorption of carbohydrates, fat and proteins.
Pancreas is anatomically divided into 3 parts which are head, body and tail. Greater than 70% of the pancreatic cancers occur in the pancreatic head ,20% in the pancreatic body and the remaining in pancreatic tail.
Pancreatic cancer is a deadly disease with poor survival rates.
Pancreatic cancer is the 4th most common cause of cancer related deaths in United States. More than 98% of the patients affected by pancreatic cancer die. It is more common in males than females and in blacks than in whites.
Pancreatic cancer diagnosis at an early stage is very difficult as the symptoms in the initial stages of the disease are vague and the diagnostic procedures are not quite sensitive to diagnose the disease at an early stage. The diagnosis is usually made at an advanced stage of the disease , making it very difficult to treat. Even complete resection of the tumor is not curative and only 5% of the patients survive for 5 years.
Important reasons for the high death rates in pancreatic cancer are:
The disease spread rapidly to surrounding structures and metastasizes to other organs through lymphatic system
Difficulty in diagnosing the disease at an earlier stage.
Even complete resection is not curative due to the presence of occult metastasis (hidden spread) of the disease at the time of diagnosis
Pancreatic cancer cells are very resistant to chemotherapeutic agents.
Thought recent studies and clinical trials are providing promising results, curative resection remains the only hope for patients to any improvement in survival, at present.