How do you find out if you have lung cancer?

Question

I'm really concerned about my dad's smoking habits, so I forced him to go get a check-up, but outside the normal blood and cholesterol tests, there was no other body checkups. I hope nothing is wrong with him, but I'm still worried, so is a normal check-up all you need to make sure, or are there other tests?

He has gone to the doctor, but only to get a check-up. Is there a specific test he is suppose to ask for?

Answer 1

Unfortunately, it's not that easy. There only way to diagnose lung cancer at an early stage is a cat scan. But there's a lot of controversy over having cat scans for screening (for lung cancer) in smokers. So far, there's no evidence of a benefit on overall survival. So, I wouldn't recommend doing a cat scan.

Ok, that means that you can't rule out lung cancer in your father. You have to live with that risk.

However, he should stop smoking as this reduced his risk for lung cancer, cardiovascular disease, lung disease,... So you should continue motivating him. I wish you good look.

Answer 2

If he's not having specific symptoms (e.g. weight loss, night sweats, coughing up blood, etc.), then his doctor won't do much besides what he's done already.

Has he had a chest X-ray? If he has a cough or other symptoms, a lot of times doctors will order a chest X-ray, which can sometimes show cancers in the lungs.

However, chest x-rays can miss small cancers. The best way to tell is to look at the lungs with a Chest CT. It's a type of X-ray imaging that doctors can use to look at the lungs, and it is more sensitive than chest x-rays when used by radiologists to detect lung cancers.

However, if he's not having symptoms, he won't get a chest CT. He may not even get a chest x-ray. Chest X-rays have not been shown to be an effective method of screening for lung cancer, so insurance companies don't pay for them for screening purposes. He would have to have symptoms before they'd pay for it.

If he has no symptoms, you likely wouldn't know he has lung cancer until he does have symptoms and gets more imaging studies done. This is the problem with smoking. You usually don't get symptoms until your cancer is relatively large.

Keep working on convincing him to stop smoking. It's also bad for you if you're around him when he's smoking. Remind him of that.

Answer 3

Tell your Dad to have chest x-ray, I had surgery to remove a non small cell lung cancer tumor on Oct 12th, luckily it appears that all of the tumor and malignant lymph nodes are gone. X-rays and CT scans have limitations. Even the CT scab can on see masses greater than 1/8 of an inch. Tell your dad if he is as lucky as I was he will still have a 13 or 14 inch incision and about 25 percent of his lung will be removed. You may also want to show him the survival rates for lung cancer that has progressed beyond a surgical cure.
The 5 year rate of survival is very grim even with a good response to chemotherapy. If I can be of more help don't hesitate to ask. Try to get him to quit without being too aggressive. Quitting is hard. Cigarette makers know how hard it is for some people to quit which is why they agreed to pay millions of dollars in fines to the states for health care.
the states are wasting the money and nothing is being provided for smokers health care.

Answer 4

There are no specific screening tests for lung cancer. Tumors can be detected on x-ray or CT scan but these tests are not done unless theres an indication (certain symptoms). If he is having difficulty breathing or is coughing excessively and bringing up blood then a doctor may perform these tests otherwise theres not much else to do. He should try to quit smoking, there are many tools that can help (nicotine patch, gum, meds...)

Answer 5

Well, usually you can't tell that someone has cancer unless there's obvious symptoms such as excessive pain and whatnot. In order to fully check, he'd need a CAT scan.

Answer 6

ct scan or mri of lungs

Answer 7

See:
http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/lungcancer.html#cat5

Answer 8

You go to the doctor!

Answer 9

go to the doctor