1. Stage
The first thing your doctor will likely tell you is the specific type of cancer you have, says Bryce, followed by the stage.
“The stage of cancer describes the extent of cancer, guides treatment choice, and can potentially indicate if the cancer is curable or not,” says Shanthi Sivendran, MD, senior vice president for cancer care support at the American Cancer Society and a hematology/oncology physician at Penn Medicine in Lancaster, Pennsylvania.
It’s important to know that the stage is defined differently across cancer types. Your doctor can provide information about what it means for you.
2. Grade
A tumor may receive a grade, based on how its cells appear under a microscope. As with stages, the grading system varies by cancer type. In general, a low grade means the cells are likely to spread or grow slowly. High-grade cells are expected to spread or grow faster.
3. Locally Advanced
Your oncologist may use this phrase to describe cancer that has spread to lymph nodes near the original tumor. Whether the cancer has spread can affect which treatments your team recommends.
4. Metastasis
Metastasis is when cancer cells have spread from one part of the body to another, usually through the bloodstream or lymphatic system.
If this has happened with the cancer you have, your team may describe it as “metastatic,” which means it has spread farther than locally advanced cancer.
5. Standard of Care
You may hear your doctor mention that a certain treatment is the standard of care. That means it’s generally accepted to be the proper treatment for this particular disease at this time. You might also hear this called “best practice” or “standard therapy.”
6. Chemotherapy
Dr. Sivendran says that it’s important to understand early on what treatments are available to you and which specific types your doctor recommends.
7. Radiation Therapy
In radiation therapy, high-energy rays or particles are used to shrink, kill, or damage cancer cells. External beam radiation therapy uses a machine to target a specific area with radiation, whereas internal radiation therapy puts a solid or liquid radiation source inside the body via a catheter, ingestion, or IV.
8. Immunotherapy
There are several types of immunotherapy. They all change the immune system to help the body fight cancer, disease, and infection. Immunotherapy trains your body’s immune cells to identify and destroy cancer cells, as well as produce more cells to do this. Common types of immunotherapy drugs include cancer vaccines, CAR T-cell therapy, checkpoint inhibitors, immune system modulators, and monoclonal antibodies.
9. Hormone Therapy
For some types of cancer, you may take medication to change hormones in your body to slow or stop cancer growth.
10. Adjuvant Therapy
“Adjuvant” is used to describe a treatment that complements or helps a main treatment. For example, a doctor could recommend surgery to remove a tumor, followed by hormone therapy as an adjuvant to kill any cancer cells that may remain.
Sivendran explains that treatments may be done in conjunction with each other. She says it’s important to know what order you’ll be getting them in and what side effects are common.
11. Biomarker Testing
Your care team could order tests to learn more about the cancer you have. Biomarker testing looks at genes or substances in the body that offer information about whether a cancer is likely to spread, treatment is working, or the cancer might return. Biomarker testing may involve biopsies, blood tests, or saliva or skin samples.
12. Palliative Care
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