Lung cancer is the number one type of cancer as far as death rates are concerned. This has mainly been the case since the boom and worlwide success of the tobacco industry. Unfortunately, lung cancer does not warn us for a long time before about its presence so by the time you diagnose it you might have very poor chances for survival. The first effects it shows, the first symptoms you become worried about might even be from a secondary tumor which indicates a metastatic lung cancer, a highly advanced stage that is incurable.
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Some symptoms might however manifest earlier and you should be aware of what they might indicate so as not to simply dismiss them as some virus or injury. For example, any change in your cough should signal a warning and you should go in for a doctor's exam, especially if you are a smoker.



What's happening inside your body is an out of control division and growth of cells. Sometimes old cells don't die as they are supposed to and in the presence of other risk factors that predispose an organism to such a disruption or make it vulnerable to it, the cells build up into a solid mass we call a tumor. From the original tumor, cancerous cells can break away and spread to surrounding tissue or other parts of the body. They can enter the bloodstream and travel to other organs and as they spread you manifest more and more symptoms up to the point where you're entire body shows signs of a breakdown.

And soon enough these effects begin to surface and when you get passed the initial symptoms and start with the treatment you will have more difficulties enduring aches and side-effects from the treatment. At first, before or immediately after diagnosis you are most likely to experience symptoms such as chronic cough, chest pains, wheezing, hoarseness and even coughing up blood. Frequent lung infections like pneumonia might occur as well and also bronchitis. Weight loss is another way in which lung cancer affects your entire organism and a constant feeling of being tired and drained of all vital energy is also very common. lung cancer is very damaging for the entire body and if it spreads to the brain for example, you'll also be experiencing symptoms like head aches, difficulty with vision, seizures and weakness on one side of the body.


Every year in the US about 200,000 new cases of lung cancer are diagnosed and more than 150.000 fput of these result in death. These statistics are awful and signal a need for more awareness programs and for raising funds for research, as lung cancer is one of the most poorly funded cancer causes as far as research is concerned. Apparently smokers do it to themselves. but what about the collateral victims or tha people that really have done no bad choices about their lifestyle but still develop it becasue of a genetical predisposition?

Lung cancer is the deadliest cancer in the world and it accounts for more deaths than other forms of cancer put together. This however doesn't bring it any closer to an epidemic. Lung cancer's main cause and if not the cause of all lung cancers most certainly the reason for the increasing numbers of incidence is smoking. Lung cancer is by no means contagious but if you consider the spread of smoking contagious in a way than lung cancer can too begin from one individual and spread to many of those influenced by that individual.
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Even so, by definition lung cancer is not contagious and no doctor will smile at any other presumption. How could anybody think you can become lung cancer by just staying near a patient or touching him or her. Even sexual intercourse presents no risk whatsoever of ever contacting the disease. The only scientific way in which lung cancer could be transmitted from an individual to another is by genes, as lung cancer risks are higher is you have a family history of lung cancer. Other risk factors include being over 50, working in industries where you are exposed to asbestos, nickel, ether, chromium, beryllium and arsenic and being exposed to second hand smoke. Exposure to radon has also been proven to lead to lung cancer. These are the real causes behind lung cancer and not one of them get's close to being contagious, except the fact that it is hereditary.



If you think many of these risk factors apply in your case, schedule yourself for a medical examination and don't wait for symptoms to come along. Lung cancer is very hard to diagnose in a stage that is not too advanced to offer o good prognosis for life expectancy. Most cancers begin to show symptoms only after they are invasive and usually inoperable anymore. So if you have the slightest suspicion that you are under a high risk of developing lung cancer get testes and if results are negative start taking periodical tests so that you can detect the cancer on time.



Doctors don't really care to detail on this subject. Any doctor would simply tell you:"No, lung cancer is not contagious." and would move on. It is strange that such a rumor could have spread in the first place. Perhaps people are mistaking lung cancer with radiation from therapy, which can indeed affect also the ones around the patient undergoing it. Sometimes it is recommended that you don't carry any babies while you are undergoing radiation therapy. But that also doesn't stay with the baby longer than you're carrying it and besides from making him more vulnerable it doesn't directly cause any illness for the baby.

Lung cancer has lately become one of the most notorious types of cancer and because it is the cancer with the highest death rate, a lot of attention has been directed towards it and a lot of information and many myths have developed around the subject. At times it can become very difficult to find the essential information about lung cancer and less on lateral debates and myths.
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Some facts are definitely necessary to know and keep in mind even if you are not even suspected of developing the disease and even if you are not a smoker. This modern day cancer is told to be diagnosed for a new patient every two minutes worldwide.

It's a fact that lung cancer kills more people than breast, prostate, colon, liver, kidney, and melanoma cancers combined. This makes it responsible for 30% of all cancer deaths.

Its a fact that the main cause for lung cancer is smoking.



The next fact you need to know while ignoring other myths about it is that if you quit smoking you will surely improve your health but it will not cure or prevent lung cancer though it can significantly reduce the risks of developing it. 65% of patients diagnosed with lung cancer are either former smokers or people who have never touched a cigarette in their lives. Your best chance is in never starting to smoke but even so in no smokers, lung cancer remains the sixth type of cancer killer in the world.

The fact is that other causes we shouldn't neglect are pollution, genetics and exposure to asbestos, uranium, arsenic and radon.

Unfortunately, what makes it so deadly is that in its early and treatable stages it is mostly symptomless. It only becomes evident when it is too late for a cure. It's a fact that 3 out of 5 cancer patients are most likely to die within the next 12 months from diagnosis. The five year survival rate for lung cancer is just 15%.



Keeping all these in mind the next fact is a baffling one. It's a fact that less money is spent on lung cancer research than on research on other cancers. The exact numbers for 2007, estimated by the National Cancer Institute go up to only $1,415 in the case of lung cancer for every death compared to $13,991 per breast cancer death, $10,945 per prostate cancer death, and $4,952 per colorectal cancer. This is a useful fact in raising awareness and putting pressure on authorities and medical institutions to give more attention to this subject.

This poor investing policy can be explained by the fact the lung cancer is a stigmatized disease being many times viewed as cases of suicide and blame the indifference and irresponsibility of smoker.

Nowadays, people are not longer healthy as they used to be in the past, they do not care so much at their health although today they have access to a larger game of products, medical care services and medical centers, many type of medicines, evolved therapies and other things of this kind .
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Nowadays people are much more ill than they used to be and the number of people who are infected with serious illnesses that prove to be even deadly for them is very high and the number is still increasing . Of all the types of disease which have appeared the cancer is one of the most serious and it affects people of different types and also because it is found under many forms it can affect many organs and even vital functions that in the end cause them death .

In the past years, lung cancer has been the type of cancer which has caused the highest number of cases of cancer all over the world and over 1,3 millions people are diagnosed with lung cancer each year in all the corners of the world . And even more than this : there would have not been such a problem if there had not died over 1 million people killed by this disease annually . The list of lung cancer patients seem to grow more and more with each years that passes by and it seem that nothing can stop this number to grow even more .

The lung cancer has such a high mortality rate due to various factors but one of the most important factors is the fact that lung cancer is a hard disease to detect because the patients do not present early signs of the disease when it just appears . In this way because of the lack of symptoms they do not go to the doctor and the cancer is not discovered in time, meaning in early stages when the chances of survival are much more higher . The only chance for detecting the lung cancer in early stages is to go to the doctor regularly and to make radiographies or to have made blood tests that could show the affection of the lungs so the apparition of the lung tumors could be detected .

The list of lung cancer patients will still be growing especially because of its main cause that it is responsible for over 90 per cent of the total cases of lung cancer and this is about smoking ; smoking is the main causes of the apparition of lung tumors, which grow, develop and affect the whole part of the lung and also its vital functions . If the people who are exposed to this risk meaning the smokers do not realize that smoking will bring them a lot of problems, here especially we are talking about lung cancer, and they do not take attitude by giving up smoking, there can not be done something to stop the number of lung patients to grow .

In the recent periods of time there has been a lot spoken about all the diseases that affect our generation and the statistics have shown that lung cancer is one of the most common type of cancer in the last period of time because over 1,3 millions people are being diagnosed with this disease and over 1 million people die each year killed by this.
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So because of all this things it is important to make public some facts on lung cancer in order for everyone to understand all the things that are linked with this affection .

The main factors that should be taken in count when we talk about lung cancer are the patients actually who gets lung cancer, what are the causes, why is such a difficult disease and why the mortality rate is so high . First thing is that there are some small causes like radon gas or particulates than can cause cancer but the main cause of lung cancer is the smoking .

The people who develop lung cancer are usually the smokers and also the passive smokers the people who do not smoke but who stay around smoke and in this way they inhale smoke because the main factors which determine the apparition of the lung tumors are the substances contained by the nicotine and other components of the tobacco contained by the cigarettes .

The lung cancer prevention is one of the most efficient ways to manage to stop the apparition and development of lung tumors and also in this way people can eliminate for completely the risk of cancer . But even if a person has smoker, if he quits smoking, there are chances for him to manage to reduce the harm that has been done to the lungs gradually and in time the risk of developing lung cancer can be reduced very much .

Other important facts on lung cancer are the ones linked to the fact that lung cancer is a disease which is hard to be detected because when it appears and in early stages, meaning the first and two stage out of four, the lung cancer do not present symptoms and it could only be discovered if the patient makes some radiographies or some blood tests that could show the presence of lung cancer in the lungs . In early stages the lung tumors could be removed with the help of surgery with only one condition : the place where the lung tumors are localized permit the intervention to take place and it does not consist a risk for the life of the patients .

In all stages even the advanced ones like stage three and stage four there are the chemo therapy, the radiation therapy, a combination of the both therapies and also some medicines that can be applied to the patient but they do not always give the best results and also they could have many side effects on the body of the patients because they are very aggressive .

The statistics of the last few years point out that the largest number of people who are killed by a type of cancer are the lung cancer patients and over 1 million people die each year because of this affection . It has even been said that the lung cancer kills more people than all the other types of cancer together and these things are due mainly to the little options of treatment that the patients have and also because the majority of patients are found in an advanced stage of lung cancer .
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When lung cancer is discovered in early stages meaning stage one or stage two, things are a little more easier and there are more types of treatment that can be applied . First of all the lung cancer is about the lung tumors that are formed in that place of the lung cavity and once they form and appear in that area the cancer is localized there ; the stage one is the stage when this thing occurs and if it is detected through a radiography or a blood test, there can be made many investigations and if the place of the tumors allow an intervention to take place, there takes place the surgery which can be used to remove the lung tumors which are responsible for the cancer .

In stage two this thing could be possible only if the lung cancer has not started to spread to the lymph nodes that are found in the nearby areas of the tumors . Stage three is the stage in which the majority of lung patients are found in and this is a bad thing because is one advance stage but really what is stage 3 lung cancer .

This thing happens mainly due to the fact that in this faze the patients start to show and present some symptoms like coughing very persistent, coughing up blood, having back and chest pain and also shortness of breath and in some cases repeated affections of the lungs like bronchitis .

So when lung cancer is found in such an advanced stage of progression the lung cancer starts to be very complicated because the cancer is no longer just a local cancer so it is not found just in lungs ; lung cancer starts to spread to many other parts of the body and in this way starts to affect organs and especially the vital functions start to be affected by the cells which are affected by the cancer and it also has reached he lymph nodes which are not in the nearby places of the tumors but the lymph nodes from the same body part as the tumors, and also the most affected organs are : the adrenal glands, the bones and all the bone system, the digestive system, the heart and even the brain . If you have understood what is stage 3 lung cancer you can realize that the chances for curing are not so big as in the early stages of the disease .

The most common type of lung cancer is the non small cells lung cancer and it has four different stages of progression beginning with the first one or stage one which is the earliest stage when lung cancer just appears and ending with stage four or the terminal stage of lung cancer .
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The high rate of mortality registered by this disease is due mainly to the fact that people who are diagnosed with lung cancer usually are found with cancer in advanced stages when the things are not so optimistic like in early stages. Many do not know what to expect in stage four or if they have some life expectancy so it is important to know what is stage four lung cancer .

This stage is the terminal faze of the lung cancer but it does not look in the same way to all the patients because there are not two people who act the same, not two bodies that have the same evolution and the cancer does not progress in the same way in all the patients . The lung cancer in stage four usually is defined as a lung cancer which is no longer local because it has passed that stage, that it has spread to other parts of the body and to the lymph nodes but there is no such general rule that can tell for sure in which areas and organs has the cancer spread and in which he does not .

There are some factors that have to be taken in count when we refer to the lung cancer patients in stage four ; for example, the age of the patients counts very much because the young people tend to live longer than the old patients although they have the same stage of lung cancer, also the women have a higher survival rate than man and also a very important factor of the lung cancer stage overall is the general state of health .

When patients are diagnosed with lung cancer is important to take a serious look at their health because patients who have no other disease and they have a strong organism they have many options for treatment and they can also resist more at the treatments and also they have a larger life expectancy also . In this stage and till this stage the options for treatment can be chemo therapy, radiation therapy and many mixtures of these therapies , medicines and they can have many results among patients and in some there can appear side effects and in other there can appear none .

What is stage four lung cancer is in fact the terminal lung faze but it does not to mean that it is also the end because there is a smaller life expectancy , a smaller one but there is a 10 per cent of people who manage to survive the five year life expectancy that they are given the moment they are diagnosed with lung cancer .

When people hear all the statistics meaning how many people die because of lung cancer and how many are diagnosed each year with this illness , they become very paranoia and scared . This is not the good reaction but numbers are worrying because they show that the illness is very cruel and has no mercy : over 1 million people die each year killed by the lung affection and over 1, 3 million are diagnosed with lung cancer per year .
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These numbers are increasing so it is important to give to the audience some explications about the risk factors of lung cancer and all the important facts linked with this disease . First of all it is important to know the causes of lung cancer which are and how serious they are ; there are the following causes radon gas, viruses, asbestos, particulate matter but it is important to outline that all these cause together do not cause more than 10 per cent of the total cases of lung cancer and the majority of them meaning 90 per cent of the cases are caused by the smoking .

The smokers and also the passive smokers meaning the people who do not smoke but who stay in an area where it is a lot of smoke, they inhale a lot of smoke and the both categories develop some risks . The risks can also vary from men to women meaning that women who smoke develop a risk of getting lung cancer of 17.2% meanwhile men who smoke have risks of 11.6% . Also the numbers are also different when we refer to non smokers meaning that women are exposed to a risk of 1.4% and the men to a risk of 1.3% .

There is a very tight connection between the smoke meaning the cigarettes, the period of time in which a person smokes and the development of lung cancer . The substances contained by the tobacco are the responsible for forming the lung tumors which give the apparition of lung cancer and of they are inhaled too much they start to be gather in deposits and they will form the tumors .

There can be also some other risk factors of lung cancer taken in count if we want to find many causes which are responsible of the high rates of mortality in lung cancer patients . Some other facts can be linked with the cancer like the fact that lung cancer is hard to be detected in early stages when it would be more likely to be discovered because there a lot more chances to be cured than in advanced fazes .

Other important fact are the complications and the side effects of the lung cancer on the patient’s body because after cancer has progressed it starts to spread to many other parts of the body and it can get to affect many organs and functions that are vital for the life of the patient and they can be deadly to the patient more rapidly than the cancer itself .

Cancers are one of the most terrible diseases and their survival rates are extremely small and if we refer to lung cancer it is one of the roughest types of cancer because it has extremely high mortality rates, over 1 million die each year killed by this infection and over 1,3 million new cases appear each year .
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The high mortality rate is due mainly to the fact that lung cancer is hard to discover when it is at the beginning and the it could be cured . One important factor of lung cancer is also the type of lung cancer because there are two major categories which have also some types .

The categories are established by the way how the cells of the lung tumors which actually give the lung cancer are seen at the microscope and they have also some particular things and they do not occur in the same way . So there is the non small cells lung cancer so they are seen at the microscope as large cells and also small cells lung cancer which is formed by smaller cells how it also has its name .

The small cell lung cancer of in short saying the SCLC is one the most rarest type of cancer meaning that it appears in only 20 per cent of the total number of cases of lung cancer but this is a good thing because the small cell lung cancer progresses more rapidly and very soon it becomes metastatic and it gets very aggressive to the patient and it affects many other parts, areas and organs of the body meaning that many vital functions of the patients will soon be affected and it could prove to be fatal to the patient very rapidly .

The non small cell lung cancer occur in all the other 80 per cent of the total cases of lung cancers and it has many forms and types under which it appears and it is developed by the patients ; so there are the following types of non small cell cancers or they are short named NSCLS : the first one is called adenocarcinomas and they are usually the most frequent type, they keep almost half of the total cases of lung cancer no matter if there are small or non small cell cancer , then there is the squamos cell carcinomas which are also pretty frequent , they are about 30 per cent of the total cases of lung cancer and also there are some rare cases of lung cancer which are not included in percentages because the rates of apparition are extremely small but they are the large cell carcinomas or the undifferentiated carcinomas but when they appear they are the deadliest types because there is no treatment for them and they become to be very rapidly fatal to the patients that develops them because they cause extremely big infections that affect almost all the vital functions and organs of the body .

We hear every day, every week, every month and especially every year at the end of the year some balances that show different numbers regarding all kinds of tops ; so when it is about the health top and especially the disease top you will see each year in the last past years that one of the highest numbers of deaths caused by a illness is the one caused by lung cancer meaning over 1 million people die each year because of lung cancer ; this is highly more than other types of cancer and the causes are not so multiple but the cancer itself it is a very rough disease which show no mercy when it is installed in a person’s body .
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Lung cancer can have different causes such as : radon gas , asbestos , viruses , particulate matter but none of this is the main cause of the lung cancer cases and the highest number of people infected with lung cancer such is due mainly to smoking . Even more , only 10 and it can reach to in rare cases to 15% of the discovered cases are people who were non-smokers .

So over 90 per cent of the total cases are caused by smoking and circa 85% of the total cases diagnosed die within the first five years after the cancer has been discovered and diagnosed . The substances contained by the cigarettes are the main responsible for the development of the apparition of lung tumors and also how does lung cancer affect the body .

First of all the symptoms of lung cancer and the direct effects on the body are the main that you can see in such a patient and they consist of shortness of breath, pains in the chest, persistent cough, coughing up blood . Then are the side effects after lung cancer is no longer local and it starts to affect other parts and organs of the body as liver , brains and bone system .

Because of them there appear : disturbances of hormones , blood or other systems can be harmed and also other common complications are the ones linked with the adrenal glands . Other effect of how does lung cancer affect the body are the bone pains , usually in the backbone , thighbones and ribs , the brain .

The brain complication is one of the most severe because it comes along with other type of effect also which are very important for the patient : the patients begins to have problems with : vision , weakness on one side of the body or even both and it can also affect seizures . Also because of the level of oxygen that gets in the lung and heart cavity is much smaller due to the shortness of breath, the levels of oxygen of the blood drop very low and there can occur enlargement of the heart’s dimensions and this can be fatal to the patients because it can be killed by pulmonary hypertension .