Bone cement treatment of bone metastases

  Malignant tumors make people fearful of “tumor”, and the metastasis of tumors to various parts of the body is even more frightening. According to statistics, among various malignant tumors, breast cancer, lung cancer, prostate cancer, kidney cancer and other tumors are most likely to have bone metastasis, and the incidence of bone metastasis in the course of breast cancer recurrence is as high as 75%.  The metastasis of malignant tumor cells to the bone will eat up the bone and cause unbearable pain and discomfort, and also reduce the hardness of the bone, leading to pathological fracture. Pain leads to long-term bed rest, lack of activity and exercise, which causes disuse atrophy of muscle groups, aggravates bone loss of osteoporosis patients and increases the risk of secondary fracture, and also causes complications such as pneumonia, decubitus ulcer, power intestinal obstruction, mental anxiety, etc. When fracture occurs in the spinal vertebrae, which is the main body weight, it may also compress the spinal cord and cause serious consequences such as paralysis and inability to take care of oneself. These lesions will seriously affect patients’ quality of life and survival period. Therefore, how to solve the pain of bone metastasis, improve bone strength, and prevent pathological fracture is what many tumor patients and their families are eager to solve.  Percutaneous bone cement injection, this method is to inject a polymer, commonly known as bone cement, under the guidance of imaging equipment by directly puncturing the puncture needle into the lesioned part of the bone, which is liquid at the time of injection and can solidify to stone like strength within a few minutes after injecting into the lesioned part of the bone, thus making the lesioned bone reach normal or even exceed the strength of normal bone. This method is similar to dental filling, which can effectively increase the strength of the diseased bone, prevent pathological fracture from occurring, and provide rapid pain relief, usually within 48 hours after surgery, and can be used without or with less pain medication, with stable results. In addition, this method also has anti-tumor effect, which mainly relies on three aspects, one is thermal destruction, the temperature of bone cement polymerization 52℃-93℃, average 68℃, duration about 7-12 minutes, which can kill tumor cells; second is embolization, bone cement diffusion into the tumor blood vessel coagulation, blocking the tumor blood vessel, causing tumor ischemia or stasis necrosis; third is bone cement surround the lesion and block the lesion Thirdly, the bone cement surrounds the lesion and then blocks the lesion from continuing to invade outward.  Percutaneous bone cement injection can also be used for the treatment of pain caused by osteoporotic vertebral compression fractures in the elderly, which can rapidly relieve pain and restore the patient’s mobility.  Therefore, there are three main benefits that patients with bone metastases can obtain from bone cement injection: 1) enhancing bone hardness and preventing fractures; 2) relieving pain; and 3) inhibiting tumor growth to a certain extent.