wot are the side effects of radiotherapy please?

Answer 1

http://www.cancernet.co.uk/radiotherapy.htm

Answer 2

Radiotherapy may be given after surgery, if your doctor feels that there is a risk of the cancer coming back. It may be used instead of surgery if the cancer has spread - Sometimes it is given to shrink a tumour before an operation. It may also be used if the cancer comes back at a later date. Radiotherapy can be given externally or internally, and often as a combination of the two.

Your specilist, who plans your treatment, will be able to help you with any problems or concerns you may have.

Side effects really de3pend on where the treatment is directed. Radiotherapy to the pelvic area can cause side effects such as tiredness, diarrhoea and a burning sensation when passing urine. These side effects can be mild or more troublesome, depending on the strength of the radiotherapy dose and the length of your treatment.

However most of these side effects can be treated quite easily with tablets, and your radiotherapist can prescribe these. Any side effects should gradually disappear a few weeks after your treatment is over.

It is important to drink plenty of fluids and maintain a healthy diet during your treatment. You may feel slightly sick but this is not common. If you don’t feel like eating you can replace meals with nutritious, high-calorie drinks, which are available from most chemists and can be prescribed by your GP.

During your treatment it is helpful to get as much rest as you can, especially if you have to travel a long way each day. But you really should ask a specilist about you own specific treatment.

There may be som long term side effects as well... The blood vessels around the treated area can become more fragile after radiotherapy treatment. This can take many months or years to happen. Some people also find that the radiotherapy affects the lymph glands so can cause swelling of the arms or legs.

Answer 3

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Answer 4

Loss of the ability to spell.

Answer 5

SIDE EFFECTS
Radiotherapy is in itself painless. Many low-dose palliative treatments (for example, radiotherapy to bony metastases) cause minimal or no side effects. Treatment to higher doses causes varying side effects during treatment (acute side effects), in the months or years following treatment (long-term side effects), or after re-treatment (cumulative side effects). The nature, severity, and longevity of side effects depends on the organs that receive the radiation, the treatment itself (type of radiation, dose, fractionation, concurrent chemotherapy), and the patient.

Most side effects are predictable and expected. One of the aims of modern radiotherapy is to reduce side effects to a minimum, and to help the patient to understand and to deal with those side effects which are unavoidable.

***Acute side effects
Damage, possibly severe, to epithelial surfaces (skin, oral, pharyngeal and bowel mucosa, urothelium)

The rates of onset and of recovery depend on the rate of turnover of the epithelial cells. Typically the skin starts to become pink and sore one week to ten days into treatment. The reaction may become more severe during the treatment and for up to about one week following the end of radiotherapy, and the skin make break down. Although this moist desquamation is uncomfortable, recovery is usually quick. Skin reactions tend to be worse in areas where there are natural folds in the skin, such as underneath the female breast, behind the ear, and in the groin.

Similarly, the lining of the mouth, throat, esophagus, and bowel may be damaged by radiation. If the head and neck area is treated, temporary soreness and ulceration commonly occur in the mouth and throat. If severe, this can affect swallowing, and the patient may need painkillers and nutritional support. The esophagus can also get sore if it is treated directly, or if, as commonly occurs, it receives a dose of collateral radiation during treatment of lung cancer.
The lower bowel may be treated directly with radiation (treatment of rectal or anal cancer) or be exposed by radiotherapy to other pelvic structures (prostate, bladder, female genital tract). Typical symptoms are soreness, diarrhea, and nausea.

Swelling (edema)
As part of the general inflammation that occurs, swelling of soft tissues may cause problems during radiotherapy. This is a concern during treatment of brain tumours and brain metastases, especially where there is pre-existing raised intracranial pressure or where the tumour is causing near-total obstruction of a lumen (eg: trachea or main bronchus). Surgical intervention may be considered prior to treatment with radiation. If surgery is deemed unnecessary or inappropriate, the patient may receive steroids during radiotherapy to reduce swelling.

Infertility
The gonads (ovaries and testicles) are very sensitive to radiation. They will be unable to produce gametes following direct exposure to most normal treatment doses of radiation.

Generalized fatigue

***Medium and long-term side effects
These depend on the tissue that received the treatment; they may be minimal.

Fibrosis
Tissues which have been irradiated tend to become less elastic over time due to a diffuse scarring process.

Hair loss
This may be most pronounced in patients who have received radiotherapy to the brain. Unlike the hair loss seen with chemotherapy, radiation-induced hair loss is more likely to be permanent, but is also more likely to be limited to the area treated by the radiation.

Dryness
The salivary glands and tear glands have a radiation tolerance of about 30 Gy in 2 Gy fractions, a dose which is exceeded by most radical head and neck cancer treatments. Dry mouth (xerostomia) and dry eyes (xerophthalmia) can become irritating long-term problems and severely reduce the patient's quality of life. Similarly, sweat glands in treated skin (such as the armpit) tend to stop working, and the naturally moist vaginal mucosa is often dry following pelvic irradiation.

Cancer
Radiation is a potential cause of cancer, and secondary malignancies are seen in a very small minority of patients, generally many years after they have received a course of radiation treatment. In the vast majority of cases, this risk is greatly outweighed by the reduction in risk conferred by treating the primary cancer.

***Cumulative side effects
Cumulative effects from reirradiation should not be confused with long-term effects — when short-term effects have disappeared and long-term effects are subclinical, reirradation can still be problematic [1].

Answer 6

Your testicles shrink and your penis turns black.