Nasopharyngeal cancer is one of the most frequent tumors in China, and in some areas with high incidence of malignant tumors, the incidence of nasopharyngeal cancer has ranked first among all malignant tumors in the body. In Hunan Province, the incidence of nasopharyngeal cancer is especially high in the western Hunan region. The common denominator among these people is that they grew up eating salted fish and other salt-cured foods.
A Singaporean otolaryngology researcher said that although the medical community is still unable to determine what exactly causes nasopharyngeal cancer, a physician has published a paper proving that salt-cured foods are the culprit of nasopharyngeal cancer. In addition, the development of nasopharyngeal cancer is also related to EBV infection, long-term chemical exposure and genetic factors.
Because of the hidden location of nasopharyngeal cancer and its proximity to important organs such as eyes, ears, nose, throat, skull base bone and brain nerve, and its easy infiltration under mucous membrane to neighboring organs or lymph node metastasis, the symptoms of nasopharyngeal cancer are variable or not obvious and often ignored by patients or physicians. Many patients often go to internal medicine, neurology and ophthalmology first, and then go to ENT after a few twists and turns.
Because of the complexity of early symptoms, it is easy to misdiagnose or miss the diagnosis, which should cause people to be alert. Blood in nose is a common manifestation of nasopharyngeal cancer in early stage, which is manifested as blood in nose or blood in sputum after nasal aspiration. Since the blood vessels of tumor in nasopharyngeal cavity are relatively brittle and there is often no mucous membrane covering the exterior of tumor, so it is easy to have the symptoms of bloody nasal discharge. Blood in the nose is one of the early symptoms of nasopharyngeal cancer, which is often misdiagnosed as respiratory tract inflammation and should be taken seriously by patients or physicians.
When the tumor is necrotic and ruptured, there is more bleeding and the nasal mucous membrane is smelly, so it should be thought of nasopharyngeal cancer.
Nasal congestion is another early manifestation of nasopharyngeal carcinoma, mostly unilateral, and it is persistent and progressively aggravated regardless of body position. Therefore, nasal congestion is not relieved by self-application of nasal mucosal vasoconstrictors such as nasal drops. When the tumor enlarges, nasal congestion on both sides and blockage of the eustachian tube by the tumor can cause tinnitus, ear congestion and hearing loss on that side, which is also an early sign of nasopharyngeal cancer.
Swollen lymph nodes in the neck are painless, hard, poorly mobile, rapidly enlarging and fixed, and multiple enlarged lymph nodes may fuse with each other to form a huge mass. Symptoms of adjacent organs: The tumor may destroy the skull base and involve the trigeminal nerve at the early stage, showing pain in the top of the head, occipital and temporal areas, in addition to facial numbness, double vision and blurred vision.
If the above symptoms are found, timely examination should be conducted. The fiberoptic nasopharyngeal endoscopy currently used in clinical practice enables ENT physicians to have a higher accuracy rate in the diagnosis of early nasopharyngeal cancer, which is conducive to patients receiving early treatment and improving the chance of cure.