Frequently asked questions about radiotherapy for cervical cancer

  Did you know: preoperative radiotherapy is basically not done Huang Xiao, deputy chief physician of the Department of Gynecology, Cancer Hospital of Fudan University: at present, only very few hospitals are doing preoperative radiotherapy. On the one hand, preoperative radiotherapy is mostly in vivo radiotherapy, and there are few hospitals with internal radiotherapy facilities. On the other hand, there is a core tenet of tumor treatment, that is, not to take too many treatments in the same patient. In Europe and America, all radiotherapy is done after stage Ib2; while in China, radiotherapy facilities are concentrated in a few hospitals, so patients before stage IIb of cervical cancer are operated first. If surgery is still not possible under such premise, radical radiotherapy should be chosen. A patient who has radiotherapy first and then surgery will cost a lot, have poor results and suffer more pain. We do not advocate this.  Did you know: cervical cancer combined with inflammation is common Huang Xiao, Deputy Chief Physician of Gynecology Department, Cancer Hospital of Fudan University: Patients with cervical cancer combined with inflammation are mostly seen in clinical practice. For this group of patients, we emphasize to add vaginal douching or oral/intravenous anti-inflammatory drugs at the same time of treatment.  However, vaginal inflammation will not affect the approach of radiotherapy for cervical cancer. That is, we will not prevent patients from having internal radiation therapy because of inflammation.