Chemotherapy for cancer

What is chemotherapy?

Chemotherapy (also called chemo) uses drugs to kill cancer cells or prevent them from reproducing. Chemo is a systemic treatment – meaning it enters your bloodstream and travels throughout your entire body. That’s why it’s often used for cancers that have spread.

Today, nearly all chemotherapy is given as an outpatient treatment. You don’t have to stay in the hospital. It’s usually delivered through an IV, although some drugs are given orally (in pill form) so you can take them at home. Chemotherapy may also be given as a lotion to apply to your skin or as an injection under the skin or into a tumor.

How does chemotherapy work?

Chemotherapy drugs (agents) work by slowing or stopping the growth of cancer cells, which grow very quickly. They may be used to:

• Destroy cancer cells
• Make cancer less likely to return
• Slow down cancer’s growth
• Shrink tumors that cause pain or other problems

Chemotherapy side effects

Depending on the drug used, there can be various side effects of chemotherapy. However, one of the most common chemotherapy side effects – nausea – can be greatly reduced with anti-nausea medications.

One of the causes of chemo side effects is the fact that chemo drugs may damage other fast-growing cells in your body such as skin cells, hair cells and cells that form the lining of your mouth and your intestines.

Other chemotherapy side effects are:

• Anemia (low red blood cell counts)
• Appetite changes
• Constipation
• Easy bruising and bleeding
• Fatigue
• Hair loss
• Infection

Every person has different side effects. They may depend on:

• Dose and type of chemo medicines
• Type and stage of cancer
• Your overall health

Side effects have nothing to do with how well the chemotherapy is working. Be sure to let your health care team know about your side effects. Treating side effects is an important part of your treatment.

Chemo options

Sometimes chemo is combined with other cancer treatments, such as surgery or radiation therapy. In that case, the chemo may be given as an adjuvant treatment or neoadjuvant treatment:

• Adjuvant treatment is delivered after surgery to kill any cancer cells that may remain in your body. If your cancer is large or has spread to your lymph nodes, there could still be some cells left behind – even if your doctor can’t detect any cancer in your tissue. Chemotherapy or radiation therapy can help prevent the cancer from coming back.
• Neoadjuvant treatment is delivered before surgery to shrink the tumor. This can help improve your surgical results, and even prevent the tumor from recurring in that area.

Hyperthermic intraperitoneal chemotherapy (HIPEC) treatment

We’re one of a few health care providers in the country that are using this innovative delivery system for chemo. Using HIPEC means the chemotherapy medication is delivered during a surgery.

The surgery starts with removing all the visible cancers (cytoreduction) in the abdominal area. Once that’s done, a chemotherapy agent is heated and added to the abdominal area. It’s allowed to circulate for an hour or more. Then it’s drained and the surgical incision is closed as usual.

This delivery method allows the chemo to treat any cancer cells that aren’t visible to the surgeon. It’s more efficient because there are fewer blood vessels in the abdomen, so the chemo drug wouldn’t have contact with as many areas if it was delivered using an IV. HIPEC treatment often provides improved quality of life and longevity.

Diseases treated with HIPEC

When HIPEC was developed in the 1990s, it was used as a treatment for a rare cancer of the appendix. Since then, its use has expanded and it’s now used for:

Side effects of HIPEC

The chemotherapy side effects of HIPEC are similar to the side effects of chemotherapy delivered by other methods. You may also experience a leak from the intestines, pancreas inflammation, kidney failure or a decrease in bone marrow.