cigna health care article

Symptoms of mesothilioma

Mesothilioma is a tumor which transforms into cancer and defunction all the important functions that are carried out in the body. It is a fatal disease which kills silently, the affected cells get accumulated in the body for long years and show signs of abnormality after years. This cancer is mainly caused due to the inhalation of asbestos particles for a very long period of time. The then active cancer cells starts showing their adverse impact on the body and the organs starts malfunctioning. Mesothilioma is a disease which attacks the patient only after the patient becomes old. As per the medical records, the disease is mostly detected at the age of above 40 years.

Generally the symptoms of mesothilioma surface only after two to three decades of time from the time the individual has been exposed to asbestos. The symptoms don’t appear soon after the asbestos particles has been inhaled in large quantities, but they get accumulated in the lungs over a long period of time and take decades to react in the body, which forms a tumor which later transforms into a dangerous cancer. The symptoms

can’t be usually diagnosed and after they are diagnosed the maximum period the patient is expected to live is a year or two. But the period of survival is also stretched till five more years if the symptoms have been diagnosed to be mesothilioma at a very early stage and corresponding medical treatments have been taken into consideration. The time of five years can only be managed by following rigorous routines of severe medication. The life of the patient cannot be saved though, since the disease is not curable. It is absolutely fatal and does not have any cure till date.

The symptoms of mesothilioma are not very specific; the symptoms resemble any disorder in the lungs and are very general symptoms which are also the symptoms of many small, harmless diseases. This is the very reason why the disease can’t be diagnosed at its initial stages and thus the much needed steps for proper treatment can’t be taken. The general symptoms are shortness of breath, pain in the chest, cough, and loss in weight. There are two types of mesothilioma, pleural mesothilioma and peritoneal mesothilioma, the symptoms for two different types of mesothilioma are:-

1.)Pleural mesothilioma- pain in chest because of formation and accumulation on fluid in the chest which further causes short breath, hoarseness, coughing up of blood and difficulty in swallowing. Also shows some pain in upper abdomen, arm or shoulder.

2.) Peritoneal mesothilioma- the symptoms of this are loss in weight, abdominal pain and swelling of abdomen due to fluid concentration. Bowel obstruction is also a symptom along with anemia, fever, blood clots.