Some time ago, the “37-year-old man with terminal stomach cancer’s bucket list” exploded in the circle of friends.
The story is about Mr. Liu, who has been working overtime for years and often stays up late. The company’s main business is the development of a new product, a new product for the company. It was only when he was diagnosed with advanced gastric cancer that he realized that health comes first.
Professor Li Zhaoshen, academician of the Chinese Academy of Engineering and director of the Department of Gastroenterology at Changhai Hospital, has said that 90% of gastric cancer patients in China are often in the progressive stage when the disease is discovered, missing the best time for diagnosis and treatment.
“Stomach, how are you?” The ad slogan is very popular, but in real life, we don’t always pay much attention to our stomachs. Here are some misconceptions about stomach cancer that have been used for years, and you may have suffered from them before.
“Stomach pain is not a big problem,
Just take some medicine.”
Many people have had the experience of buying some “stomach medicine” at the drugstore to deal with an upset stomach. But in fact, there are many causes of stomach discomfort, and gastritis and peptic ulcers are just some of them, which can be relieved by taking medicine. The actual fact is that there are many causes of stomach discomfort, such as gastritis and peptic ulcers, which can be relieved by taking medication.
Most patients have no obvious symptoms in the early stages of gastric cancer, and it is easy to overlook.
Stomach medications may provide temporary relief, but relying on “a few pills” alone may delay the diagnosis and treatment of stomach cancer and even threaten survival. Therefore, it is important to pay sufficient attention to stomach discomfort, especially in middle-aged and elderly people, and to seek timely medical attention.
In addition, domperidone is used by many people in China as a regular stomach medicine and digestive aid at home, which is also a very big misconception. Previously, domperidone has been repeatedly warned and even recommended for restricted use abroad because of its association with serious heart disease risks, and the FDA has never even approved it for marketing as a human drug. The former Chinese Food and Drug Administration (CFDA) also revised its drug instructions in 2016, as it has a dual “status” as a prescription drug and an over-the-counter drug in China. The company’s main goal is to provide a comprehensive range of products and services to the public.
“Take the stomach-boosting cookies,
and you’ll be cured of stomach problems.”
Over the years, a variety of “monkey mushroom cookies” have appeared in the snack section of supermarkets, and the phrase “monkey mushroom cookies are good for your stomach” has gradually become popular. The price is much more expensive than regular cookies, although not much better.
In fact, “stomach support” is not among the 27 health food functions specified by the State Food and Drug Administration, and these cookies are neither health food nor recommended as health food because of their high oil and sugar content.
According to the People’s Daily, the effective dose, main effect, side effects, and population are all prescribed for drugs, and only when they are used in accordance with the requirements can they achieve the purpose of treatment. The so-called “gastric cookies” are hardly the gastric benefits they are advertised to be.
If you really want to eat cookies, instead of spending a lot of money on the so-called “stomach cookies”, you should try a few dollars a pack of soda cookies, and as for the claim of “curing stomach problems”, just listen to it, don’t take it seriously…. …
“It’s just an upset stomach,
” he said.
No need to do a gastroscopy.”
Patients often complain that they only have an “upset stomach,” so why does the doctor want to do a gastroscopy? Gastroscopy, which is often rejected or dismissed by patients because of the pain of the procedure, is considered “unnecessary.
“To confirm a diagnosis of gastric cancer, gastroscopy must be done.”
“Gastroscopy is usually a “must” to diagnose gastric cancer,” said Professor Xu Huimian, director of the Department of Surgical Oncology at the First Hospital of China Medical University and a member of the Oncology Branch of the Chinese Medical Association. Compared with gastroscopy, upper gastrointestinal imaging, multi-layer spiral CT, MRI, PET-CT and serum tumor marker test may be more “comfortable”, but gastroscopy is like the examiner walking into the patient’s stomach, replacing the examiner’s eyes and truly observing the lesions that cannot be seen directly by the naked eye. The most important thing is that gastroscopy can also take biopsies for pathological examination, which is the only gold standard for diagnosing gastric cancer, making gastroscopy an irreplaceable role in the diagnosis and treatment of gastric cancer.
In fact, with improved clinician skills and the popularity of painless gastroscopy, most patients do not experience significant discomfort during gastroscopy nowadays, so there is really no need to be overly afraid of gastroscopy.
“Having stomach cancer,
It’s contagious to your family”
In terms of epidemiology, oncogenic gene injection or cancer cells cannot be transmitted to another person by any means, so stomach cancer itself is not contagious.
The main risk factor for the development of gastric cancer, Helicobacter pylori, can be transmitted from one person to another, so gastric cancer can be “contagious”.
H. pylori can be transmitted from person to person through the oral-oral route (saliva transmission between mother and child or husband and wife), the fecal-oral route (contamination of water by feces from an infected person), the gastric-oral route (transmission through gastroesophageal reflux or vomited stomach contents), and intra-family transmission (close contact between family members, such as sharing food without chopsticks, not sharing meals, etc.). The oral-oral route is the main mode of transmission.
Although more than half of the world’s population is infected with H. pylori, only 1% to 3% of the infected population eventually develops gastric cancer. Therefore, even if you are infected with H. pylori through some means, you do not need to panic, and you can still eradicate H. pylori by talking to a medical professional and taking appropriate and effective measures.
“Cancer is an incurable disease,
You don’t live long with stomach cancer.”
Stomach cancer is seen as incurable by many people. A great concern for every cancer patient and family is how long the patient has to live.
In fact, the survival time of patients with gastric cancer is related to a number of factors, including the pathological stage of the tumor. In fact, the survival of patients with gastric cancer is related to many factors such as the pathological stage of the tumor. Early gastric cancer lesions are limited to the superficial layer of the stomach wall, and after surgical treatment, the 5-year survival rate can be 90% or more.
With the improvement of surgical techniques and the development of multidisciplinary integrated treatment such as radiotherapy and targeted therapy, the prognosis of patients with progressive gastric cancer has also been greatly improved. Therefore, gastric cancer is not an incurable disease. As long as we pay more attention to gastric cancer, detect potential lesions early and actively cooperate with treatment, patients can still achieve good survival benefits or even achieve a cure.
In conclusion, stomach cancer is not scary, what is scary is our ignorance of stomach cancer knowledge. If early detection and treatment are available, stomach cancer can be completely cured and survive for a long time. Identify these word-of-mouth stomach cancer myths to keep you away from stomach cancer!