• Question: what is the early signs of cancer?

    Asked by mariam236 to Amar, Ana, Andrea, Leah, Matt on 11 Mar 2014. This question was also asked by randompanda.
    • Photo: Matthew Lam

      Matthew Lam answered on 11 Mar 2014:

      The early signs of breast cancer are finding a lump in your breast, sore nipples, nipple discharge and other changes to the breast. It relies on the person noticing these changes and going to their doctor as soon as possible.

      Research into breast cancer is pushing towards a way to detect breast cancer much earlier on because we know that women have the best chance of beating the disease if it is detected early. Scientists are investigating the very early stages of breast cancer (before a lump or tumour has formed) to find new ways to detect the early signs.

    • Photo: Andrea Hanvey

      Andrea Hanvey answered on 11 Mar 2014:

      Depends where the cancer is, Matthew has mentioned breast cancer,

      so i will talk about bowel cancer, depending where the tumour is in the bowel the patient may present to the GP with frequent diarrhoea , or the opposite constipation, the patient may feel the need to go to the toilet more often, they may have blood and or mucous in their poo. they may also have sudden weight gain or loss.
      Best thing for people to do is if its not right get it checked!

    • Photo: Anastasia Wass

      Anastasia Wass answered on 11 Mar 2014:

      All cancers have different signs, a common sign is unexplained weight loss but if you ever feel ill you should go to your doctor as they can often rule out other diseases or test for cancer!

    • Photo: Amar Joshi

      Amar Joshi answered on 11 Mar 2014:

      Cancers start out as a single rogue cell. This is the earliest cancer, but you would not be able to feel any change. While normal cells grow at a very measured pace, cancers just grow and grow and grow. Until you noticed this you would not be able to feel any tumor

      However, some tumors also give other signs, for example the cancer that I work on, myeloma, give a characteristic blood protien signal that can be detected but this requires a test. And colon cancers can change your bowel movements.

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