Vajara Nagavajara
3150300512
医学使
2016年 4 月 10 日
Cancer Leads to Death Death… Something that no one could escape from. It was once said that any living things have to die whether it is going to be an animal or a person like us. However, every living thing has different life span. Even though they are in the same species, they could possibly have similar life spans. As mentioned above, we can’t really run away from death, but we can choose how we die, by controlling our own habits and the actions we do. Diseases are one of the major causes of many deaths. These diseases can cause from many factors: airborne, infectious, non-communicable, food borne, and last but not least our lifestyle. Cancer is one type of the diseases that can cause death. …show more content…
So it’s not a surprise that from the dawn of the history of people have written about cancer. Some of the earliest evidence of cancer is found among fossilized bone tumors, human mummies in ancient Egypt, and ancient manuscripts. Growth suggestive of the bone cancer called, osteosaroma have been seen in mummies. Bony skull destruction, as seen in mummies, Bony skull destruction as seen in cancer of the head and neck, has been found as well. During the Renaissance, beginning in the 15th century, scientists developed greater understanding of the human body. Scientists like Galileo and Newton began to use the scientific method, which later was used to study disease. Autopsies, done by Harvey led to an understanding of the circulation of blood through the heart and body that had until then been a mystery. In 1781, Giovanni Morgagni of Padua was the first to do something which has become routine till today; he did autopsies to relate the patient’s illness to pathologic findings after death. This laid the foundation for scientific oncology, the study of cancer. The famous Scottish surgeon John Hunter suggested that some cancers might be cured by surgery and described how the surgeon might decide which cancers to operate on. I f the tumor had not invaded nearby tissue and was “moveable,” he said, “there is no impropriety in removing it.” A century later the development of anesthesia allowed surgery to …show more content…
Today, a radical mastectomy is almost never done and the “modified radical mastectomy” is performed less frequently than before. Most women with breast cancer now have the primary tumor removed, and then have radiation therapy. Stephen Paget, an English surgeon, concluded that cancer cells spread by way of the bloodstream to all organs in the body but were able to grow only in a few organs. In a brilliant leap of logic he drew an analogy between cancer metastasis and seeds that “are carried in all directions, but they can only live and grow if they fall on congenial soil.” Paget’s conclusion that cells from a primary tumor spread through the bloodstream but could grow only in certain, and not all, organs was an accurate and highly sophisticated hypothesis that was confirmed by the techniques of modern cellular and molecular biology almost a hundred years later. This understanding of metastasis became a key element in recognizing the limitations of cancer surgery. It eventually allowed doctors to develop systemic treatments used after surgery to destroy cells that had spread throughout the body so that they could use less mutilating operations in treating many types of cancer. Today these systemic treatments may also be used before surgery. During the final decades of the 20th century, surgeons developed greater technical expertise in
3150300512
医学使
2016年 4 月 10 日
Cancer Leads to Death Death… Something that no one could escape from. It was once said that any living things have to die whether it is going to be an animal or a person like us. However, every living thing has different life span. Even though they are in the same species, they could possibly have similar life spans. As mentioned above, we can’t really run away from death, but we can choose how we die, by controlling our own habits and the actions we do. Diseases are one of the major causes of many deaths. These diseases can cause from many factors: airborne, infectious, non-communicable, food borne, and last but not least our lifestyle. Cancer is one type of the diseases that can cause death. …show more content…
So it’s not a surprise that from the dawn of the history of people have written about cancer. Some of the earliest evidence of cancer is found among fossilized bone tumors, human mummies in ancient Egypt, and ancient manuscripts. Growth suggestive of the bone cancer called, osteosaroma have been seen in mummies. Bony skull destruction, as seen in mummies, Bony skull destruction as seen in cancer of the head and neck, has been found as well. During the Renaissance, beginning in the 15th century, scientists developed greater understanding of the human body. Scientists like Galileo and Newton began to use the scientific method, which later was used to study disease. Autopsies, done by Harvey led to an understanding of the circulation of blood through the heart and body that had until then been a mystery. In 1781, Giovanni Morgagni of Padua was the first to do something which has become routine till today; he did autopsies to relate the patient’s illness to pathologic findings after death. This laid the foundation for scientific oncology, the study of cancer. The famous Scottish surgeon John Hunter suggested that some cancers might be cured by surgery and described how the surgeon might decide which cancers to operate on. I f the tumor had not invaded nearby tissue and was “moveable,” he said, “there is no impropriety in removing it.” A century later the development of anesthesia allowed surgery to …show more content…
Today, a radical mastectomy is almost never done and the “modified radical mastectomy” is performed less frequently than before. Most women with breast cancer now have the primary tumor removed, and then have radiation therapy. Stephen Paget, an English surgeon, concluded that cancer cells spread by way of the bloodstream to all organs in the body but were able to grow only in a few organs. In a brilliant leap of logic he drew an analogy between cancer metastasis and seeds that “are carried in all directions, but they can only live and grow if they fall on congenial soil.” Paget’s conclusion that cells from a primary tumor spread through the bloodstream but could grow only in certain, and not all, organs was an accurate and highly sophisticated hypothesis that was confirmed by the techniques of modern cellular and molecular biology almost a hundred years later. This understanding of metastasis became a key element in recognizing the limitations of cancer surgery. It eventually allowed doctors to develop systemic treatments used after surgery to destroy cells that had spread throughout the body so that they could use less mutilating operations in treating many types of cancer. Today these systemic treatments may also be used before surgery. During the final decades of the 20th century, surgeons developed greater technical expertise in