Stomach cancer, also called gastric cancer, is not something most people think about until it touches their lives.
But it is a serious illness that can grow quietly inside the body before showing clear signs.
Like many cancers, it begins when normal cells in the stomach start to grow in an uncontrolled way. These cells form a lump or tumor, which can spread if not treated.
Doctors don’t always know exactly why someone gets stomach cancer, but they do know some of the main risk factors.
One of the biggest is a bacterial infection called Helicobacter pylori, or H. pylori. This bacteria can cause long-term irritation and ulcers in the stomach lining, and over time, it may lead to cancer.
Other things that increase the risk include smoking, eating a lot of salty or smoked foods, having a family history of stomach cancer, and dealing with ongoing stomach problems like inflammation.
Some people also carry genetic conditions that raise their risk. Still, having one or more of these risk factors doesn’t mean someone will definitely get stomach cancer—it just means they have a higher chance.
One of the biggest challenges with stomach cancer is that the early signs are very easy to miss or mistake for common stomach issues. A person might feel a bit of indigestion, some nausea, or a sense of being full after eating a small amount.
They may also lose their appetite without knowing why. These symptoms don’t seem serious at first, so many people ignore them or treat them with over-the-counter medicine. Unfortunately, that allows the cancer to grow quietly.
As the disease gets worse, the symptoms become harder to ignore. Weight loss, stomach pain, vomiting, yellowing of the skin or eyes (a sign the liver might be affected), and blood in the stool are all signs that the cancer may be more advanced.
Because these stronger symptoms often don’t show up until the later stages, many cases of stomach cancer are not caught early, making treatment more difficult.
When it comes to treating stomach cancer, the plan depends on how far the cancer has spread, where it is located, and how healthy the patient is overall. For early-stage cancer, surgery is often the main treatment.
The goal is to remove the tumor and some healthy tissue around it to make sure all the cancer is gone. If the cancer has spread, surgery might still be used, but it is often combined with other treatments like chemotherapy and radiation.
Chemotherapy uses special drugs to kill cancer cells. It can be used before surgery to shrink the tumor or after surgery to kill any leftover cancer cells. If surgery isn’t possible, chemotherapy might be the main treatment. Radiation therapy uses strong energy beams to target and kill cancer cells, and it is sometimes used with chemotherapy to make both treatments work better.
In recent years, doctors have also started using newer treatments like targeted therapy and immunotherapy. Targeted therapy looks for specific features in cancer cells and blocks them from growing.
Immunotherapy helps the body’s own immune system find and destroy cancer cells more effectively. These newer treatments are often used when the cancer is advanced and don’t always work for everyone, but researchers are learning more about how to make them better.
Dealing with stomach cancer is hard, but medical advances are offering new hope. Doctors are improving treatments and finding better ways to detect the disease early. This is important because catching cancer early usually means better outcomes.
That’s why it’s so important to listen to your body. If you have symptoms that don’t go away—like ongoing stomach discomfort, feeling full too quickly, or sudden weight loss—it’s a good idea to see a doctor.
Stomach cancer can be frightening, but knowing the risks, recognizing the signs, and learning about the treatments can help people take action early. And in the fight against cancer, early action can make all the difference.
For more information about cancer, please see recent studies about the link between dairy food and certain cancers and this common food chemicals may cause cancer.
For more information about cancer, please see recent studies that plant-based diets may reduce risk of colorectal cancer in men, and Low-fat diet may help stop cancer growth.
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