After treatment finishes, you will have regular check-ups with your doctor. You will have a physical examination, and you may have scans or tests to check whether the cancer has responded to treatment. It may take some time after your radiation therapy treatment has finished before the full benefit is known.
When you have finished your treatment, you will be given a clinic appointment so that the doctor can check your progress. The appointments will probably become less frequent as time passes. If you are worried about anything at all, you should phone for an earlier appointment.
Once your treatment plan is completed, you will have follow-up appointments with the radiation oncologist. It's important to continue your follow-up care. Your health care team will want to check on your recovery and watch for treatment-related side effects, which may not happen right away.
After treatments like chemotherapy, radiation, immunotherapy, and targeted therapy, your doctor will examine you for any new growths. You'll also get blood tests, X-rays, and other imaging tests. These tests will measure your tumor and see if your treatment has slowed or stopped your cancer.
The radioactive material leaves the body through urine, saliva, and sweat. These fluids are radioactive, and people in close contact with the patient should take the safety measures recommended by the health care team (see below).
The general effects of radiation therapy like fatigue, nausea, and headaches resolve fairly quickly after treatment. Your body just needs time to process the radiation but can recover within a few weeks. Delayed side effects of radiation therapy, on the other hand, may require further treatment to alleviate.
The radioactive material will stay in your body for several hours or days, depending on the type that is used. Eventually, the material decays and your body naturally flushes it out through urine, sweat, and other forms of biological elimination.
During radiation treatment, the mean weight loss was 4.33 kg, and 53.6% (1303) patients had high weight loss (HWL; ΔW≥5%). The proportion of HWL was higher in patients with advanced T stage, N stage, high BMI level and who received chemotherapy.
Breast cancer: Women with breast cancer have an overall 30% chance of recurrence. Many cases happen within five years of completing the initial treatment. Cervical cancer: Of those with invasive cervical cancer, an estimated 35% will have a recurrence.
Most people getting radiation therapy feel fatigued. It does not mean that your cancer is getting worse. It does not mean that the treatment is not working. In fact, it is normal to feel very tired during this time.
The tiredness often reaches its maximum 1 to 2 weeks after the end of treatment. A small number of people are asleep for a lot of the day after a long course of radiotherapy to the brain. This called somnolence syndrome.
The effects of radiotherapy continue developing, and it may take a further couple of weeks to several months for you to feel normal, depending on the area of the body that has been treated.
Feeling very tired and lacking energy (fatigue) for day-to-day activities is the most common side effect of radiation therapy to any area of the body. During treatment, your body uses a lot of energy dealing with the effects of radiation on normal cells.
Which Type of Cancer Spreads the Fastest? The fastest-moving cancers are pancreatic, brain, esophageal, liver, and skin. Pancreatic cancer is one of the most dangerous types of cancer because it's fast-moving and there's no method of early detection.
At the same time, if a cell doesn't divide, it also cannot grow and spread. For tumors that divide slowly, the mass may shrink over a long, extended period after radiation stops. The median time for a prostate cancer to shrink is about 18 months (some quicker, some slower).
Radiation therapy to the head and neck can cause side effects that make it difficult to take in adequate amounts of food and fluids. These side effects include loss of appetite, changes in taste or loss of taste, painful chewing and swallowing, mouth sores, dry mouth and nausea.
What vitamins and supplements can I take? Not all vitamin and mineral supplements have antioxidants. For example calcium, vitamin D and vitamin B12 are not antioxidants. These vitamins and minerals are safe to take during your radiation treatment.
You usually have one treatment (fraction) a day, from Monday to Friday, for between 3 to 6 weeks. This means that you have between 15 and 30 treatments of radiotherapy in total. You might have radiotherapy to help with symptoms or slow down the growth of your tumour.
Avoid raw vegetables and fruits, and other hard, dry foods such as chips or pretzels. It's also best to avoid salty, spicy or acidic foods if you are experiencing these symptoms. Your care team can recommend nutrient-based oral care solutions if you are experiencing mucositis or mouth sores caused by cancer treatment.
Some patients worry that undergoing radiation therapy can be harmful to others because they are radioactive. For example, patients sometimes think they can't cuddle with their partner or hold a grandchild on their lap until after treatment. However, most patients don't need to worry about being radioactive.