All About Chemotherapy

What Is Chemotherapy

Informally referred to as ‘chemo’, this is a medical treatment that uses drugs to treat various types of cancer. These drugs are designed to target and destroy rapidly dividing cancer cells.

Your doctor may refer to chemotherapy as standard chemotherapy, traditional chemotherapy, or cytotoxic chemotherapy.

What factors determine a chemotherapy plan?

Understanding about chemotherapy is vital as it involves using various drugs to help destroy cancer cells. A doctor who specializes in treating cancer with medication and the one who will prescribe your chemotherapy is called a medical oncologist. You may receive a combination of drugs, because this sometimes works better than 1 drug by itself.

The drugs, dose, and treatment schedule depend on many factors. These include:

1. Type of cancer

2. The cancer's stage, considering tumour size, location, and spread

3. Your age and general health

4. Your bodyweight

5. Potential drug side effects: Excessive side effects can lead to treatment plan changes

6. Presence of other medical conditions

7. Previous cancer treatments

Chemotherapy Administration

Chemotherapy can be administered systemically in various ways:

• Through an intravenous (IV) infusion, commonly used and received by most individuals

• Via injection, typically given as a shot

• Orally, in the form of a pill or liquid for swallowing

• Topically, in the form of a cream applied by rubbing onto the skin

How does chemotherapy treat cancer?

• Chemotherapy moves around the body through your blood and can reach cancer cells anywhere, which is called systemic treatment.

• Chemotherapy targets cells that are dividing into two new cells.

• Our body has many cells; after we grow up, most don’t divide much. They only divide when they need to fix something.

• When cells divide, they split into two identical new cells. This keeps happening, making more cells. But in cancer, cells keep dividing and make a lump called a tumour.

• As cancer cells divide more than normal cells, chemotherapy can eliminate them better.

• Some drugs damage the part of the cell that makes it divide, while others stop the chemical process that helps cells divide.

Side Effects of Chemotherapy

Common side effects of chemotherapy drugs include:

• Anaemia

• Bleeding

• Constipation

• Diarrhoea

• Fatigue

• Hair loss

• Infection

• Loss of appetite

• Nausea and vomiting

• Pain & numbness

How frequently do you undergo chemo sessions?

The frequency of each session can range from many hours to a couple of days, contingent upon the drug or drug mix. Your sessions might be scheduled weekly or with intervals of 2, 3, or 4 weeks. The frequency is also determined by the specific drugs used and your overall chemotherapy plan. When chemotherapy is administered through an infusion pump, the drugs might be delivered:

• Consistently over a few months (continuous administration)

• Over a few days during each month

• Across a span of a few weeks