COMPLETE Guide For Chemotherapy Effects and It's Treatment

Chemotherapy Administration

Administration of chemotherapy drugs

Cancer is a dreadful disease and the drugs that are administered to control cancers are also very powerful. These drugs are administered by specialists like a hematologist, medical oncologists, pediatrician, surgical oncologists and gynecologist.

Chemotherapy drugs can be taken either in the liquid form or in a capsule form. Intravenous form of administration of this drug is also possible. Many a times the drug is injected into the spine so that the drug gets mixed with the fluid in the spinal cord. Depending upon the drug used to treat cancer and type of cancer the drugs are thus administered in different ways.

Which are the places where they administer chemotherapy?

As most of the chemotherapy drugs are powerful you need to get yourself hospitalized for a few days. These drugs are administered by trained nurses administer at specific intervals as per the doctors prescription.

Time duration of chemotherapy

With the advancement in science and technology more and more new drugs are coming into the market to treat cancer and many other diseases. There has been a dramatic change in the administration of chemotherapy drugs also. Before the administration of these powerful drugs the patient is tested as every individual has his or her own body constituency and the size and area of the tumor also varies from a person to person. One mode of treatment may not suit the other and so the time and the mode of treatment vary from person to person.

How does one know that the treatment is effective?

There are different ways through which the doctor comes to the conclusion that the patient is responding to the treatment of chemotherapy like asking the patient to undergo certain tests like blood tests, scans x-rays etc. This is done during the initial stages of the treatment so that the doctor can compare the results with the final results to see the difference after the treatment.

Four different methods to administer chemotherapy drugs:

Depending upon the type of cancer and the spread of it the doctors have a four fold plan to treat you with chemotherapy drugs.

1] Oral administration: here the drugs are administered orally and is the most convenient method

2] Topical administration: This method is used to treat cancers of the skin and it comes in the form of lotions and gels which is applied on the skin surface.

3] Injections : Anti-cancer drugs are injected with the help of a syringe on the muscles or sometimes directly on the area that has been affected by cancer.

4] Intravenous chemotherapy: chemotherapy drugs are administered into the body through drips; this helps the drug to pass throughout the body as it flows directly into the blood stream.

There are many supportive treatments that have shown to help treat cancer patients. Chemotherapy not only acts on the part that is affected by cancer but it also acts on those parts of the body that are nowhere directly affected by cancer. This is the reason why cancer patients show side effects.