Cancer surgery: Physically removing cancer

The prospect of cancer surgery may make you feel anxious. Put your mind at ease by learning more about cancer surgery and how and why it's used.
Cancer surgery — an operation to repair or remove part of your body to diagnose or treat cancer — remains the foundation of cancer treatment. Your doctor may use cancer surgery to achieve any number of goals, from diagnosing your cancer to treating it to relieving the symptoms it causes. Cancer surgery may be your only treatment, or it may be supplemented with other treatments, such as radiation, chemotherapy, hormone therapy and biological therapy.

read more at http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/cancer-surgery/CA00033

What is laparoscopic surgery?

Laparoscopic surgery is often referred to as 'key-hole' surgery. This is where small cuts are made in the patient's stomach and then a harmless gas is pumped in to create a working space. Through additional small cuts, a rod shaped telescope, attached to a camera, and other long and narrow surgical instruments are placed into the newly formed space. The surgeon then uses these instruments to perform the surgery and remove the cancer.

Key-hole surgery is used for other types of operations, but its use in colorectal cancer surgery has been limited because of concerns as to how well it works in the long term and concerns that it may cause a spread of the cancer cells. Also because the surgeon can't put his hand directly on the liver and other body organs he/she cannot feel if the cancer has spread and may not be able to confirm how serious the cancer is.

read more at http://www.nice.org.uk/guidance/TA17/publicinfo/html

International Surgery Links

The Karolinska Institute, Sweden
French Medical Web Search
International Agency for Research in Cancer
Netherlands National Cancer Institute
German National Cancer Network
The UK Gray Laboratory, Northwood, Middlesex and portal (mirror site) to the US National Cancer Institute

Surgery Links

The Royal College of Surgeons of England
The Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh
The Association of Surgeons of Great Britain and Ireland
The European Society of Surgical Oncology
American College of Surgeons
Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Glasgow
Royal College of Nursing Royal College of Surgeons of Ireland
Royal College of Physicians Royal College of Pathologists
Royal College of General Practitioners
Royal College of Anaesthetisits
Royal College of Radiologists
British Society of Gastroenterology
ASIT
Pelican Cancer Foundation
National Cancer Institute Association of Coloproctology of Great Britain and Ireland
Association of Upper Gastrointestinal Surgeons
The Vascular Society
British Association of Thyroid and Endocrine Surgeons Association of Laparoscopic Surgeons of GB and Ireland British Association of Plastic, Reconstructive and Aesthetic Surgeons
UK Endocrine Pathology Society

Why Is Surgery Used for Cancer?

Surgery can be done for any of several reasons. It is often done to reach more than one of these goals:
Preventive (prophylactic) Surgery
Preventive surgery is done to remove body tissue that is not malignant (cancerous) but is likely to become malignant. For example, this type of surgery may be used if you have a pre-cancerous condition such as polyps in the colon.

read more at http://www.cancer.org/docroot/ETO/content/ETO_1_2X_Surgery.asp

Cancer Treatment Surgery

Surgery
For many centuries, surgery was the only treatment for cancer. The famous 18th century surgeon, John Hunter, suggested that surgery might cure cancer if the tumour had not invaded the surrounding tissue. He remarked that "if the tumour is moveable... there is no impropriety in removing it".
But early surgery was a risky procedure. Pain, infection and haemorrhage limited its usefulness and success until anaesthetics were discovered in the 1840s. In 1846, John Collins Warren performed what is thought to be the first major cancer operation under general anaesthesia - the removal of a patient's cancerous salivary glands.

find out more.. http://info.cancerresearchuk.org/cancerandresearch/learnaboutcancer/treatment/surgery/?a=5441