It was the most insidious sign of liver cancer!
Prof. Dr. Onur Yaprak gave important warnings about insidious liver metastases. Professor Dr Leaf pointed out that the liver is the bloodiest and largest organ in the body, saying: “It is the only organ in the body whose blood supply passes through two separate vessels, both arteries and veins. of all the intestines, pancreas and stomach mainly goes to the liver, cancer metastases often develop in these organs in the liver.Cancers seen in the liver may be hepatocellular carcinoma or cholangiocarcinoma which originate from the liver’s own cells Similarly, cancers that develop in other organs often metastasize to the liver. Most cancers that develop in the liver are actually cancers that arise from this metastasis. It is seen 20 times more often than cancer that arises from the cells of the liver yourself.
Noting that “yellowing of the eye can be seen in advanced stages,” most metastases show no symptoms at first. Dr. Yaprak provided the following information about the symptoms observed in the following periods: “Since the patients are already diagnosed with cancer of other organs and are under oncological control, they are detected in routine follow-up examinations. These patients already have blood tests that show liver function at certain intervals and tests for cancer markers in the blood. In addition, scans such as ultrasound, MR, CT or PET tomography are performed. Oncological checks and these screenings are essential for the early detection of metastases. Symptoms begin to increase, causing swelling in the liver and pressure on blood flow and bile flow.
When liver metastases enlarge, symptoms such as loss of appetite, weight loss, bloating, indigestion, feeling of fullness in the abdomen, pain, nausea and in the late stages jaundice, yellowing of the whites of the eyes, dark urine and accumulation of water in the abdomen occur can be seen. ‘It can jump even after years’ Prof. dr. Dr. Leaf stated that liver metastases can develop in other organs even years after treatment of the original cancer, and continued: “Metastases to the liver from organs such as the colon, pancreas, stomach account for 50 percent of all metastases. The other 50 percent is caused by metastasis of organ cancer such as breast, lung, ovarian, uterine and skin cancer. Cancer cells, mixed with the general blood and lymph circulation, first form very small metastases, called micrometastases, when they stop at the liver and attach. These metastases develop new capillaries to meet their own nutrient and oxygen needs to grow over time. In this way, the cancer cells that make up the blood supply begin to grow uncontrollably. Cancers of neighboring organs such as kidneys, adrenal glands, and bile ducts spread to the liver. ‘New generation chemotherapy drugs are successful’ According to Prof. Dr. Yaprak shared the following information: “The treatment of patients who develop liver metastases is done by evaluating many factors.
Treatment depends on which organ it has spread, how many metastases there are in the liver, which part of the liver it has spread to, whether there are simultaneous metastases in other organs such as lungs, bones, brain, age and general physical performance of the liver. the patient. Treatment options for liver metastases include surgery, interventional radiology, chemotherapy, and immunotherapy.
Therefore, treatment should be performed by a team of experienced liver surgeons, interventional radiologists and oncologists. In fact, we have made many patients who had cancer of a very large size or number and who could not be operated on in the past, operable thanks to a special method that we can summarize as 2-stage surgery. In addition, “chemoembolization,” which is the delivery of intravenous chemotherapy to the cancer area by angiography, and “chemoembolization,” which is the prevention of blood flow to the cancer, or “radioembolization,” which is the delivery of nuclear spheroids, or “microwave ablation,” the treatment of burns with an external needle through interventional radiology, has shown very successful results in patients who cannot undergo surgery. In some patients, we go into surgery along with interventional radiology and do a combination of surgery and ablation. In terms of oncology, the new generation of chemotherapy drugs show much better results than the old ones.”