Testicular cancer occurs when cancer cells establish in one or both of the testicles. Testicles are the male reproductive glands located within the scrotum. The scrotum is a sack of loose skin which contains the testicles and hangs directly below the penis.
Testicular Cancer Comes Back After Treatment
Testicular Cancer Relapse Rate
Sometimes testicular cancer comes back after you have completed your treatment. Medical professionals call this a relapse. The danger of the cancer returning depends upon the type and stage of cancer and ranges from 13 to 50 %.
If the cancer is going to return, it is probably to do so within 2 years of completing your treatment. Less than 1 in 20 regressions take place later on than that.
Treatment for Relapsed Testicular Cancer
Even testicular cancer that returns can be treated. The treatment you have depends upon
- The kind of testicular cancer you have
- The treatment you have actually currently had
- Where in your body the cancer returns
Chemotherapy
Many men who have relapsed testicular cancer have chemotherapy. The drugs you have will differ depending on whether you have actually had chemotherapy before. There is detailed info in the chemotherapy for testicular cancer area.
If you had chemotherapy prior to, you may have treatment with various chemotherapy drugs or treatment with high dosage chemotherapy. The high dosages of chemotherapy will damage your bone marrow and stop you making blood cells. So you will have some stem cells gotten and frozen before you begin the treatment.
The stem cells are defrosted out and given back to you after the chemotherapy has actually worked. This is called a stem cell rescue. You may also hear it called stem cell transplant. It is just used as part of scientific trials.
Surgery
Surgery is a crucial treatment if the cancer returns in the lymph nodes in your abdominal area. The operation to remove abdominal lymph nodes is called a retroperitoneal lymph node dissection.
You might also have surgery to remove secondary cancers from the lung.
Radiotherapy
Radiotherapy can be utilized to deal with seminoma that has actually returned after it was first treated. It can likewise be used after surgery for non seminoma that has actually returned. This suggests that the treatment is focused on the area where lymph nodes have actually been removed in case any cancer cells are still there.
Testicular Cancer (TC) Relapse Rate: Experts Answers
Q: What are the main symptoms and tests that result in a diagnosis of testicular cancer versus that of something else?
Expert: In the vast bulk of cases the patient presents with a mass within the body of the testicle. While this is generally pain-free, the mass can be associated with pain and the existence of pain does not provide any consistent peace of mind that the mass is not cancerous. More seldom, patients present with symptoms of metastatic disease, the most typical being severe, unrelenting back pain related to retroperitoneal metastases or shortness of breath, and hemoptysis (coughing up blood) associated to lung metastases.
The signs medical professionals commonly rely on making diagnosis are:
– The physical exam; a mass that is in the body of the testis that is not able to be separated from the testis provides a presumptive diagnosis of testicular cancer up until tested otherwise.
– Commonly, urologists supplement the physical examination with an ultrasound of the testis. Occasionally this offers extra details that either verifies or refutes the putative diagnosis of testicular cancer.
– These tests are augmented by serum blood markers, beta HCG, and alpha-fetoprotein; nevertheless, in approximately 50 % of patients with early stage non-seminoma do not have positive markers. Accordingly, the absence of raised blood markers in no chance ought to dissuade the work-up from continuing to eliminate testicular cancer.
Q: What is the regular time for microscopic cancer in the abdomen to become something recognizable (such as via CT)?
Expert: This is mostly speculation, but, for instance in surveillance programs, most of patients who recur (80 %+) do so in the first year, most of the rest do so in the second year and relapse after 2 years is unusual (a few percent) We continue to follow patients relatively aggressively till year 5, and after that once a year after that.
Q: Is there a common duration for late regression?
Expert: Late relapse is specified as [regression] beyond 2 years from the preliminary diagnosis, but the pattern of regression alters a bit, as we saw today, based on the existence or absence of factors like lymphovascular invasion. Those patients tend to repeat a bit quicker than patients without lymphovascular intrusion, who are most likely to recur in the 2- to 5-year variety.
