About Cancer

 

 

Our body is made up of cells. All cancers begin in cells, which are the fundamental unit of life. To understand cancer, it’s useful to know what happens when normal cells become cancer cells.

 

Our body is made up of several types of cells. These cells grow and divide in a well-controlled set manner to produce more cells as they are needed to keep the body healthy. As cells become older or damaged, they die and are replaced with new cells.

 

However, due to certain reasons this normal condition is interrupted, which leads to an abnormal behavior by the cells, typically in one part/organ of the body, where the cells continue to multiply and live beyond their lifespan. These are referred to as the ‘cancerous cells.’

 

The term ‘Cancer’ is used to describe a medical condition, where there is….

 

• Abnormal and uncontrolled multiplication of the body cells
• Genesis is typically in one organ/part of the body
• These mutant cells can migrate and invade other parts of the body through blood & lymph
• Manifestation of the disease is the form of a tumor – a group of mutant cells that form a tissue
• These can affect all living cells in the body, at all ages and in both genders
• The cause is multi-factorial and the disease process differs at different sites.

 

‘Cancer’ is not a single disease but it refers to a group of diseases which share similar characteristics. Doctors classify cancer on the basis of the tissue from where it originates. For example, the term ‘carcinoma’ is used for the cancer that originates from the skin or in tissues that line or cover internal organs; and the term ‘leukemia’ is used for the caner that starts in the blood-forming tissue such as the bone marrow and causes large numbers of abnormal bold cells to be produced, which enter the blood.

 

Factors such as tobacco consumption, environmental exposures to carcinogens, certain infections as well as genetic predisposition play an important role in carcinogenesis.