Treatment

Cancer treatments like traditional chemotherapy and radiation therapy are designed to kill cancer cells. But they also harm healthy cells. This can cause serious side effects. Targeted therapy is a different type of treatment. It targets only the cancer cells in your body. This minimizes the damage to healthy cells.

This nonsurgical procedure uses beams of radiation to treat tumors or lesions deep inside the brain. The treatment may take several hours. Children may be given general anesthesia to keep them from moving during the procedure, but adults are usually kept awake.

During this procedure, your doctor removes a tumor from the inner wall of your bladder. That's the organ that holds your urine. Transurethral resection can help your doctor diagnose and treat bladder cancer.

This surgery removes one or both adrenal glands. These small glands are on top of each of your kidneys. They make hormones that are used for many body functions. You may need to have an adrenal gland removed if your doctor finds cancer or a growth in it. This surgery also helps if your adrenal glands make too many hormones.

This surgery treats tongue cancer. To get all of the cancer, a small or large part of your tongue may be removed. In some cases, the entire tongue must be removed.

This surgery removes cancer (or other abnormal tissue) from your breast. A small amount of healthy tissue is taken, too, but the rest of the breast tissue is spared. The goal of a lumpectomy is to leave you with as much natural breast tissue as possible. We also call it "breast-conserving" surgery.

This surgery removes one or both breasts. Most often, it's used to treat breast cancer. We also use it to prevent breast cancer in those who have a very high risk for the disease. Let's take a moment to learn more.

This is a problem with the immune system. It's when your white blood cells don't make enough antibodies. What are antibodies? They're proteins that help your body fight germs. Without these antibodies, you get infections more easily than other people do.

Cancer vaccines stimulate your immune system. They help your immune system recognize and fight viruses linked to cancer, or fight cancer cells directly. There are two types of cancer vaccines, "preventative" vaccines and "treatment" vaccines.

Bone marrow is a soft, spongy tissue found inside the large bones in your body. It's where new blood cells are made. Bone marrow can be damaged by disease. It can be destroyed by chemotherapy or radiation therapy. A stem cell transplant uses healthy stem cells to rebuild your damaged bone marrow.

This treatment uses radioactive pellets called "seeds" to destroy prostate cancer cells. The seeds are implanted in your prostate. Each seed is about the size of a grain of rice.

This memory and concentration problem happens to some cancer patients during and after chemotherapy. With chemo brain, you feel like you're living in a haze. This makes it hard to do daily tasks.