Chemotherapy

In order to understand how does chemotherapy work it is very essential to understand first the regular life cycle of the cells present in our body. One should know that all the living tissues in our body are composed of cells. The cells continuously grow and regenerate new cells in order to replace the cells which were lost during an accident or in the normal wear and tear. The cycle of the cells helps in the replacement of both the cancer affected cells and the normal cells by producing new cell.

Although the discussion about how does chemotherapy work is technical but it nevertheless helps an individual to understand how the doctors predicts different types of drugs to be given to a particular patient and what should be the doses. The cycle of the cell includes five stages namely G0 which is the resting stage, G1 which is the RNA, G2 the construction and the mitotic apparatus, protein synthesis, S DNA synthesis and M which refers to Mitosis.

If you are eager to know how does chemotherapy work you should know what the drugs are and how they indulge themselves in treating the cancer. The drugs used in the chemotherapy hinders in the reproduction and the division of the cancer cell. At the same time it also damages the normal and the sensitive cells like the cells which are forming a line around the bone marrow, the digestive system, the hair follicles and mouth. When the body of the cancer patient is charged with anti cancer drugs the cancer cells as well as the healthy cells damages. However, as soon as one stops their chemotherapy most of the damaged cells recover again.

The knowledge about the function of the drugs in the question how does chemotherapy work forms the basic part. Every drugs used in the chemotherapy treatment has its own way of killing and stopping the growth and production of the cells of the cancer. Sometimes the drugs are made in such a way that it attacks the cells of the cancer from various ways. There exists about more than 200 drugs for cancer which can be used in more than fifty combination. There are some cancers like prostate cancer that is resistant to only one agent of chemotherapy. In such type of cancer the combination treatment of chemotherapy has proved to be very successful.

In order to satisfy the question of how does chemotherapy work one should also know the strategies involved in this therapy. The chemotherapy acts on the tumor by shrinking and removing it. It is an effective process as it does not need any surgery. The plan of post operative chemotherapy is used to kill any tiny cells which are so small that it cannot be detected or removed in the surgery. There are also some cases where the doctors cannot remove certain cells as it may endanger the life of the patient. In such cases also chemotherapy is used. In such cases it doesn’t act as a cure but used for lessening the tumor and symptoms.