Early detection and self-examination of bone tumor
Among the tumor diseases, some of them, such as stomach cancer and liver cancer, are well known, but many people may not have heard of or seen bone tumor, let alone have a deeper understanding of it. In this article, we will introduce what is bone tumor? What are the early manifestations of bone tumor patients; how to detect abnormalities in body and conduct self-examination; when to suspect you have bone tumor and when to go to hospital for medical treatment.
Bone tumor refers to tumors that occur in bone or originate from various tissue components of bone, including primary, secondary or metastatic tumors. Those that grow from bone tissue itself are primary, while those that metastasize from malignant tumors of other organs or tissues to bone are secondary. Half of the primary tumors are benign, while most of the secondary bone tumors are malignant, and the mortality rate of malignant tumors can reach 80-90%. The etiology of bone tumor is still unknown, but some scholars believe that it may be related to bone injury, chronic infection, radiological stimulation, genetics and directional transposition of bone development process. The age of onset of primary bone tumors is generally low, mostly occurring in young and adolescents with vigorous bone growth, and the high incidence age is 15-24 years for men and 5-14 years for women, and men are higher than women. Secondary bone tumors mostly occur in the elderly.
There are many types of bone tumors, and the preferred sites of different bone tumors are different, many of them are found in the epiphysis of long bones. Generally, primary malignant bone tumors occur in the long bones of the limbs; secondary bone tumors occur in the pelvis, spine and femur. Among the distant metastases of many organ malignant tumors, bone metastases take the first place, and the overall prognosis of bone malignant tumors is poor, and the natural survival period without treatment after diagnosis is several months to one year. Therefore, it is more important to be alert to the occurrence of malignant bone tumors among bone tumors.
Early detection of bone tumors has a great impact on the patient’s access to medical care, the doctor’s diagnosis and treatment, and the patient’s prognosis. Therefore, it is very important to be familiar with the common symptoms of bone tumor for early detection and timely consultation.
Common symptoms and performance of bone tumor
Bone and joint pain, bony mass and functional disorders are considered as the three main symptoms of bone tumor, especially malignant bone tumor.
Pain In case of minor trauma or no trauma, there is obvious pain in bone and joint, especially at night, with a tendency of progressive aggravation, and painkillers are ineffective. Pain is the most significant symptom of fast-growing tumor, but pain does not necessarily indicate that the tumor is malignant. Some benign tumors, such as osteoid osteoma, can cause pain in response to the growth of bone. A sudden and severe attack of pain is likely to be a pathological fracture.
Second, masses usually appear locally in bone and bone joints. Slow-growing tumors or tumor-like lesions rarely have obvious swelling until dysfunction occurs or pathological fracture occurs. Benign tumors often appear as solid masses without pressure pain; while rapidly growing malignant tumors grow faster as diffuse swelling, and the masses have adhesions with adjacent tissues, poor mobility, hard texture and less clear borders (just the opposite of benign bone tumors), and the tumor surface is uneven and has pressure pain.
If the tumor is near the joint, the activity function will be restricted, and it will be painful when moving, and there will be swelling and pressure pain. Tumors in the spine, no matter benign or malignant, can compress the spinal cord and cause paralysis.
If the tumor is rich in blood vessels, the skin color may change significantly, the skin may become hot and the superficial veins may become angry.
These are the common clinical manifestations of bone tumors, but many bone tumors do not have typical clinical symptoms in early stage, so early detection is difficult. Some patients find bone tumor only after injury or pathological fracture through x-ray examination. Therefore, it is necessary to go to a regular hospital for examination when there are above manifestations, even if the symptoms are mild.
Because the prognosis of benign and malignant bone tumors are very different, and malignant bone tumors are usually life-threatening. Therefore, it is necessary to further understand the differences between the above three major symptoms of benign and malignant tumors.
Benign bone tumor, in general, develops slowly and has no obvious early symptoms, pain and swelling are not very obvious. Only when it grows to a certain extent near the joint, it may cause mild functional impairment or deformity. Benign bone tumor usually has a solid, fixed mass, growing on the side of the bone end, with clear boundary, smooth surface and no pressure pain. Sometimes benign bone tumors have pressure or normal pain but can be relieved by treatment with sodium salicylate medication. Other common benign bone tumors include chondrosarcoma, which is also located near the knee joint. Asymptomatic benign bone tumors may not need to be treated.
Malignant tumors with the above three major manifestations are usually more prominent. The early symptoms of malignant tumor in bone joint may also be very mild and not be taken seriously. In order to achieve early detection of malignant bone tumor one should pay special attention to the following cases and do further examination.
(1) When adolescents suddenly develop unexplained pain around the knee joint with progressive aggravation.
(2) When adolescents develop acute osteomyelitis such as fever, limb pain, swelling and leukocytosis, they should be alert to the possibility of Ewing’s sarcoma and osteosarcoma.
(3) Multiple endophytic chondrosarcomas, multiple osteochondrosarcomas and long tubular solitary osteochondrosarcomas are prone to malignant transformation into chondrosarcoma, and should be reviewed regularly to prevent malignant transformation when there are the above mentioned lesions.
(4) When the elderly have unexplained limb pain and low back pain, and there is a tendency of progressive aggravation, they should be alert to the possibility of metastatic bone tumor.
(5) When there is swelling, local mass, pain in soft tissues of limbs, and pressure pain in tendon membrane, fascia and adjacent areas of joints, the possibility of synovial sarcoma should be considered first, not to be easily mistaken for benign lesions such as arthritis, cysts and fibroids.
Early diagnosis of bone tumor
When the above symptoms are found in the early stage, especially in men aged 15-24, women aged 5-14 or elderly people with the above symptoms, they should be alerted to the occurrence of bone tumor and go to regular hospital immediately for systematic examination so as not to delay the disease. The doctor’s diagnosis is mainly through the combination of clinical, radiological and pathological.
X-ray examination: X-ray performance of bone and soft tissue can reflect the pathogenesis of bone tumor. Some tumors under X-ray film show bone deposition, collectively called reactive bone; sometimes they show bone destruction or bone resorption. The common malignant bone tumor X-ray manifestations include “Codman’s triangle”, “onion skin” phenomenon, “sunlight ray” and other patterns. Some fast-growing malignant tumors rarely have reactive bone and show osteolytic defects on X-ray.
Pathological examination is the only reliable examination to confirm the tumor, which is divided into two types: excisional biopsy and puncture biopsy. Pathological examination of tumor can determine the histological type of tumor, the benignity and malignancy of tumor to determine the surgical staging of bone tumor. Surgical staging is used to evaluate bone tumors and to classify benign and malignant bone tumors to formulate treatment plans.
In addition, biochemical assay is also a diagnostic tool that cannot be ignored. In patients with bone tumors, blood calcium tends to be elevated when there is rapid bone destruction; osteogenic tumors have significantly elevated alkaline phosphatase; elevated acid phosphatase in men has significant significance for bone metastasis. Elevated total protein concentration and positive Benzo’s protein suggest plasma cell myeloma.
At the end of the article, we remind you that the treatment of neoplastic diseases, especially malignant tumors, is still a difficult medical problem, and early detection, early diagnosis and treatment are crucial for all kinds of tumors. Bone tumor is still a kind of disease that is not familiar to the public, so it is necessary for the public to know more about bone tumor, so that most patients can be detected, diagnosed and treated immediately, in order to increase the cure rate and improve the prognosis of bone tumor.