Palliative Chemotherapy

Palliative chemotherapy is a cancer treatment given to manage symptoms and improve quality of life when a cure is not possible. Unlike curative treatment, its primary goal is to shrink tumors, alleviate pain or discomfort, and potentially prolong life by slowing cancer progression. When chemo is used to shrink the tumor, reduce symptoms, improve quality of life or prolong life, it’s called palliative chemotherapy. Palliative chemo is typically used when cancer has spread and chemo is not being used. The main goal is to improve your quality of lifeTrusted Source. It’s not curative in nature and hence doesn't aim at eliminating the cancer.

When we talk about palliative chemotherapy, the first thing to understand is that we’re shifting the goalposts. Success isn’t measured by whether we can eliminate every last cancer cell. Instead, we measure it by how much we can improve your life after the cancer staging is available. The entire approach is built on three core ideas, and all of them revolve around you. This isn’t a choice between fighting the cancer and giving up. It’s about finding a smarter, more sustainable way to live with it. The treatment plan is designed to imporove the symptoms, make life easy and quality better.

Types of Cancer For Palliative

Palliative chemotherapy can be used for a variety of cancers when a cure is no longer possible, typically metastatic (stage 4) cancer. The type of cancer is less important than the stage of the cancer, although it may help determine the type of chemotherapy drugs used. Palliative care is important for relieving symptoms and improving quality of life. Palliative chemotherapy can be part of that, particularly for the treatment of incurable cancer. Certain cancers for which palliative chemotherapy has shown specific significant benefits include:

Pancreatic cancer - For metastatic pancreatic cancer, palliative chemotherapy may improveTrusted Source the quality of life.

Non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) - For NSCLC, palliative care may improve pain, shortness of breath, and fatigue.

Breast cancer - For metastatic breast cancer, palliative chemotherapy may improve the quality of life.

Doctor and Cost

Cost of the palliatiev chemotherapy depends upon the cancer type and more importantly symptims of the patients. We need to understand that palliative chemotherapy comes with palliative care. Palliative chemotherapy may work on the cancer cells but other general symptoms that need to be managed may involve treatment from other specialist and superspecialist apart from the cancer specialist. Hence the cost would just not be that of the palliative chemotherapy but of palliative care as a whole.

Dr Singh is one of the best medical oncologist in Bhagalpur, Bihar for the treatment and management of cancer. He specializes in chemotherapy for various types of cancer. If you have an individual health insurance policy then this surgery is covered after a period of 2 years from the date of inception of the policy. However if you are a beneficiary of company given policy then the surgery is covered from day one. Always go through the terms of your health insurance policy like room rent capping and co-payment to avoid any kind of financial shocks later on.