We keep hearing that lung cancer is the deadliest cancer of all cancers and that it accounts for more deaths than prostate, colon and breast cancer put together. This is certainly a warning sign against smoking but it is much more than that. It is a reason for constant monitoring of our health, our condition, of a responsible life-style and a consideration for those around us, as 3000 people get lung cancer each year from second-hand smoke. Another particularity that makes it so deadly is the fact that it shows no symptoms in its early stages and it is usually diagnosed only as it advances and becomes more invasive. The location, size and whether it has spread to lymph nodes determine the stage and the treatment.
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So just how tragic are these death rates and are they really so dramatic or is it just a way to educate people to be afraid of smoke and smoking?

Unfortunately statistics indicating the death rates in lung cancer are overwhelmingly sad. Let's take a look at some statistics showing the progress of the disease throughout the years.



Lung cancer affects more approximately 200.000 Americans each year and represents 15% of all cancer diagnoses and 28% of cancer deaths.

Statistics show that in 2008 219,440 adults were diagnosed with lung cancer. Out of these 116,090 were men and 103,350 were women. Out of these cases resulted in death were estimated at 159,390 patients, more men than women. Another relevant and worrisome statistic is that showing the one-year survival rate, which for all cancer patients is 41%. The 5-year survival rate dramatically drops to 15%.

Since 2003 the death rates for women have stabilized have. Until then they had been increasing steadily since the 1970s. For men, the death rates have been declining ever since 1994 at a rate of approximately 2% each year. Statistics also point out to the fact that Afro-American men have the highest incidence and the highest death rates.



However, these statistics shouldn't do more than give us a big picture on the impact of lung cancer. They shouldn't tell you too much about each individual case. These statistics don't apply to every person and they are also measured in intervals of more years so advances in treatment and other modifications might not be included in them.

The most important thing is that at all stages, lung cancer is treatable and there have been cases where the patient's survival was against all odds. Furthermore, each year more progress is done through research and clinical trials so we can expect new and more effective treatments any day now. Make sure you keep yourself up to date and never lose hope in overcoming the cancer. Ask your doctor about all risks and benefits of clinical trials and always research alternative treatment. Great results can come out of biological therapy though these can vary significantly from case to case. Make sure to seek a second opinion and even ask around about other people's experience with lung cancer. You never know what will bring about a new hope for your case.

Lung cancer can many times spread to lymph nodes or bone marrow in an advanced stage. This is not what lymphoma cancers are. Lymphoma cancers start the other way round, they begin in a type of white blood cells called lymphocytes, important components of the immune system, and then reach and settle in other organs, like the lung.
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There are two types of lymphomas: Hodgkin's lymphoma and non-Hodkin lymphoma and they both area malignant and manifest themselves through similar symptoms. The difference between them is considerable nonetheless and can be established through biopsy or aspiration of tissue from the tumor.

Hodgkin's disease is less common than the other as it accounts for no more than 1% of all cancers in USA, and its incidence is still declining.



This cancer of the blood, originating in lymphocytes that can be found in lymph nodes, the spleen and the bone marrow, can at present offer considerable chances for a cure. Outstanding progress in chemotherapy and radiotherapy has done a great job in eliminating this cancer. However, recent study shows that undergoing such treatments imply a risk of developing a second malignant disease. Systematic reviews of studies and research conducted in the last years have revealed a risk of lung cancer in patients treated for Hodgkin's lymphoma. This has been proven in many cases documented since 1985 in England and focused on long-term side-effects of chemotherapy and radiotherapy for Hodgkin's lymphoma.

Side-effects of radiation and chemotherapy have earned a notorious reputation along the years but usually they are related with nausea, hair-loss, vomiting, fatigue but many failed to consider the highly ironical possibility that they could generate a new cancer in the body. Unfortunately this can be the case for lung cancer derived from treatment for Hodgkin's lymphoma. The link between the two is today beyond the shadow of a doubt but at least now that we know about it we can take measures to prevent it. Ask your doctor about the risks of chemo and radiotherapy and constantly monitor the rest of your body even if you are treating a limited tumor.



Let's return to the vast research that has linked treatment for lymphoma with lung cancer. What this treatment does is increase the risk of patients undergoing it to develop lung cancer. Numbers tell us that the risk is much higher and that it increases with time if treatment is prolonged but it also can extend beyond the duration of the treatment and is significantly higher in patients over 45. If the patient is also a smoker his chances for survival drop dramatically and research referring to a group of people considered to be in a high-risk category show that out of 1000 people 50-150 people will develop lung cancer 10-20 years after being treated for Hodgkin's lymphoma.

With almost a million victims every year, lung cancer is the type of cancer with the highest death rate. While smoking is the main cause and accounts for around 80% of the patients diagnosed with cancer, what really makes the difference between high and low chances if survival is the stage in which the cancer is at the moment of diagnosis. Since early stages of lung cancer are almost asymptomatic, specialized tests are very important to be done at the slightest indication or even if you just realize you present many risk factors that make you susceptible to developing the cancer. Even if you haven't developed it you can still use the gratefulness for your health to prevent any future occurance.
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Staging and accurate diagnosis are vital in establishing an effective treatment program. Treatment can vary significantly from stage to stage and can have dramatically different impacts on the tumor in each of these stages. Lung cancer stages range from I to IV and each stage can also be further divided into secondary stages to present optimal treatment options. Survival rates drop dramatically with every stage until stage 4, where we mostly have to worry for our lives.



Stage 4 non-small cell is also known as metastatic lung cancer. Almost 40% of patients diagnosed with lung cancer are diagnosed at this advanced stage. Unfortunately stage 4 cancer is most likely not curable but treatment is still recommended to prolong life expectancy, to alleviate cancer smptoms and also palliative treatment is recommended to ensure that the patient has the highest quality of life possible in this condition.

There's hope for finding a cure as many clinical trials are done every year with a certain progress reported with even some results to change the fact that stage 4 offers no chance for a cure.

Metastasis means that the tumor has spread to other parts or organs of the body, or to another lobe of the lung.

By the time you reach this stage symptoms become visible, to say the least. You are sure to experience symptoms like chronic cough, coughing up blood, shortness of breath, hoarseness, chest pain, arm pain, back pain, complications from pneumonia and bronchitis and wheezing. Treatment can be undergoes to alleviate these symptoms. Depending on where the tumor has metastisized you can also experience other indirect symptoms. For cancer that has spread to the bones you are likely to feel pain in the ribs, hips or in the back. For cancer that has spread to the esophagus, you might experience difficulty in swallowing and for cancerous cells that have spread through the bloodstream to the brain, you will also monifest symptoms like confusion, headaches, memory loss, changes in your vision. Weight loss and fatigue are also characteristic to metastasis.



Stage 4 lung cancer is considered to be inoperable, but it can be treated with chemotherapy and other targeted therapies. Radiation therapy can act as a palliative therapy which can significantly ease your discomfort throughout the struggle.

The life expectancy, meaning the 5-year survival rate for stage 4 lung cancers is no higher than 10%. The amount of time after diagnosis patients are expected to live up to is aproximately 8 months.

Lung cancer survival rates is a hot subject but it can really raise awareness on the dangers of lung cancer and the importance of taking all possible measures to prevent it. The survival rate is an indicator of the percentage of people with a certain type of cancer and at a certain stage of development who survive the disease for a particular amount of time after diagnosis, the standard amount of time usually being 5 years.
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Extensive research has been done on this subject and they are based on large groups of people. Even so, though it gives a general picture of the evolution and impact of the disease it has no power of prediction what will happen in every individual case. There's actually a great deal of variation between each lung cancer patient and the way he or she responds to treatment.



The survival rate is influenced by some factors when calculated. Usually it depends on factors like the cancer's stage of development, the type of the cancer, the presence of any symptoms, the general condition of the patient and the patient's history with cancer.

Once established these and the cases split into categories it's possible to go on with the research and reach some final numbers and conclusions.

Let's take a look first at the survival rates by the type of the cancer. In the case of small cell lung cancer the overall 5-year survival rate is only 6%. For non-small cell lung cancer it is roughly 15% and for bronchioloalveolar carcinoma (BAC) the survival rate is considerably better reaching 60%. In one study the rate was 100% as the tumors were caught early and operated on.

Survival rates by lung cancer stage are probably the most searched for stats on the subject of lung cancer. Before you read these numbers you should know that these don't necessarily mean anything for you as every case is different as has different ways in which the cancer evolves. Staging lung cancer can of course help guide treatment, but there's also need for customization and cancers can vary also within the same stage.

In the case of stage 1 non-small cell the numbers are encouraging with a survival rate of 60-80%. In the case of stage 2 non-small cell the numbers drop to 40-50%. The most dramatical drop follows as for stage 3A non-small cell cancer is only 23% and for the next the 5-year survival rate is only 10%.



Offering little chances of a cure, the stage 4 non-small cell cancer (metastatic) has a 5-year survival rate of sadly less than 10% while in the limited stage, the final stage small cell lung cancer the overall 5-year survival rate is only about 6%.

As you can see, the most visible conclusion is about the importance of an early diagnosis and of course also about the necessity of keeping yourself safe from the disease by consulting the doctor and ensuring you have a healthy lifestyle.

When you hear about lung cancer, you will for sure think that because it is cancer for sure there are many people who die of lung cancer . But for many may be a surprise to find out that actually the number is extremely big in comparison to other types of cancer and even other diseases . You really do not have an idea of how many people die of lung cancer per year .
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The annual number of people who are diagnosed with lung cancer is about 1,35 millions and almost 1,18 millions die each  year . The number is extremely big in contrast to many other affections . This fact is caused by a number of factors which make the survival rate to be extremely small . Lung cancer is very hard to be detected in early stages because at the beginning it has no symptoms and then the most frequent signs can be misunderstood as belonging to a terrible flu : persistent cough , losing weight without keeping a diet or making intense exercises , feeling tired, chest pain .



In the majority of cases , the cancer is discovered when it is advanced and this is a great inconvenient in the process of stopping the disease to spread and to heal . The tumor which is found in the lungs may be extremely large and it can be located in different areas where it is hard to be removed by surgery . Also the treatment can be too aggressive and can have many side effect and it can heal on one part and it can harm on other part .

Another thing that contributes to the small rate of survival is the complications that appear in all the cases . Lung cancer as any other type of cancer starts to spread very rapidly and it soon starts to affect other parts of the body such as liver, bones, adrenal  glands, liver and even the brain and heart . It is extremely difficult to combat all these effects and all the organs which are affected are vital ones and you can not live longer if they do not function at the normal parameters . If the cancer fluid starts to spread through the body and it can easily affect the heart . Because the lack of oxygen in the heart’s area , the level of oxygen in blood drop and are very low which leads to shortness of breath again , and the sizes of heart become too big in comparison to the normal size and especially on the right side and it can cause a failure of the heart which is named by the doctors as a pulmonary hypertension .



Because of these major complications , sometimes it is hard to say how many people die of lung cancer per year actually or if they die quicker as a result of the complication or because many vital organs which become affected fail and there is no treatment which can prevent all these side effects .

Lung cancer is very often deadly because it is really hard to detect it in an early stage and also because once discovered in an advanced level it becomes hard to cure  .Everyone knows that cancer kills annually many people but nobody knows how many people die from lung cancer each year .

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Lung cancer is the most common form of cancer that kills annually 1.18 million people and over 90% of the total cases registered are caused by smoking . Smokers have a greater chance to develop this disease than non-smokers ; the risk to develop this lung affection  is almost double among the smokers . What is even more important is that not only smokers are affected by lung cancer but also the people that inhale the smoke named passive-smokers .



Lung cancer may have other causes such as : radon gas , asbestos , viruses , particulate matter but none of this has registered so many infected person with lung cancer such as smoking . Even more , only 10 or extremely rarely 15% of the discovered cases are non-smokers .  This illness shows no mercy : 85% of the total cases diagnosed die within the first five years after the cancer has  been detected .  This higher mortality rate is due to two key major factors : lung cancer is hard to detect in early stages and when it’s discovered it has already affected other parts of their body and also because lungs are such an important life organ . Of course , as any other type of cancer , lung cancer has effects on your body not only short term effects but also long term effects . It has been proved that the substances within tobacco are responsible for causing cancer ; they are even named carcinogens or " cancer-causing-cancer "and cigarettes contain over 60 of this kind substances  .In this category of substances are included : benzo(a)pyrene and nitrosamine . Once they have reached the lungs , they settled down there for years and they start to cause DNA damage , oxidative stress and inflammation and that is only the beginning of the tumors . The body is unable to repair the DNA damage and the cells divide and multiply and they end up into a malignant tumor . One important factor that reduces the survival rate is the fact that lung cancer can have a lot of complications especially if the are delays in treatment or delays in diagnosing the disease at time . The complication affect many important organs and some  of them are also vital for a person’s life .



The best solution to stay away from this problems caused by lung cancer is prevention . If we keep in mind the risks we expose to when we decide to smoke and even more the risks we expose the people around us , maybe many smokers will quit smoking . So less people will be diagnosed with lung cancer and implicit less will have to face other health problems caused by this illness .

Lung cancer is the most common form of cancer that kills annually 1.18 million people and over 90% of the total cases registered are caused by smoking . Lung cancer is very often deadly because it is really hard to detect it in an early stage and also because once discovered in an advanced level it becomes hard to cure  .

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Of course , as any other type of cancer , lung cancer has effects on your body not only short term effects but also long term effects . It has been proved that the substances within tobacco are responsible for causing cancer ; they are even named carcinogens or " cancer-causing-cancer "and cigarettes contain over 60 of this kind of substances  .



Because of these cells , the short term effects are not shy to appear . and not so many people have asked what are the effects on the body from lung cancer . Some of the most frequent are fluid in lungs and also shortness of breath . The worst part is that because of the fluid in the lungs , cancer can spread to other parts of the body and cells which are normal can become infected with carcinogens . Following these effects , the long term effects will start to appear . This means that new health problems will develop such as : liver , brains and bone cancer . There can be : disturbances of hormones , blood or other systems can be harmed  and apart from these can appear effects due to the treatment applied , or to the type of cancer or whether the lung cancer is metastatic or not . Lung cancer often can affect also  the adrenal glands . Such effects cause bone pains , usually in the backbone , thighbones and ribs . More effects occur when lung ,metastatic cancer affects the brain . It can cause many difficulties : the patients starts to have problems with : vision , weakness on one side of the body or even both and it can also affect seizures . Because of the lack of oxygen , the level of oxygen in blood drop and are very low which leads to shortness of breath again , then  there is the risk of a great enlargement of the right side of the heart and it can lead to a  possible  heart failure which is called by doctors as pulmonary hypertension .



As you can see the effects of lung cancer on body are very rough . The patient has to deal with the problems of the lung cancer and its treatment but also he has to be applied a treatment for healing lung cancer and also for preventing the other side effects or to try to minimize them at a minimum level . The survival rate of lung cancer is small but associated with this kind of effects it is even smaller . That is why it is so important to try to prevent this disease and the best way of doing this is to quit smoking and avoid to say around people who smoke because it also harms us to intake their smoke .

Data shows that lung cancer is the biggest killer in the United States. But let's see how many people do die of lung cancer every year. Data will very from one statistic to another, but it appears that up to 160.000 people die of lung cancer each year and around 3 million people in the world.

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But let's see why so many people die from lung cancer and what it really is. The first thing to be said is that smoking is the leading cause of lung cancer, 90% of the cases being attributed to smoking, and despite it being such a deadly condition the number of smokers seems to grow each year. It has been shown that in the recent years there has been a significant growth in the number of smokers in the female population.

However this does not explain why it is so deadly, only why so many people have the condition. Lung cancer is one of the silent illnesses. Unfortunately it shows very few signs in the early stages, when the best chances of curing it still exist. Some symptoms that may exist are persistent cough, shortness of breath, pain in the arms, shoulders, chest or back, repeated infections like pneumonia or bronchitis. Also unfortunately these symptoms are often attributed to other conditions and medical care is not sought immediately.

Because of the lack of symptoms or of the symptoms being overlooked many lung cancer cases, over 50% of them, are discovered in the late stages when the cancer has already spread outside the lungs. When lung cancer is discovered in the early stages it is often done by accident as the person is being investigated for a different health problem. Some of the early stage lung cancers are discovered through screening.

Lung cancer is a disruption in the normal process of cell growth, meaning that cells will divide and hence multiply at an increased rate resulting in the formation of masses or tumors. usually outside factors like for instance carcinogenic chemicals deposited in the lungs through smoking cause DNA damage, which in turn causes the initiation of the disruption and then of the abnormal growth.

In the earliest stage the cancer is confined to the lung which in most cases makes it suitable for surgery and if surgery is successful the person can be declared free from cancer. In the following stages the malignant cells spread outside the lungs forming tumors in other parts of the body, initially in the chest area and in the final stage in more distant parts of the body like liver, adrenal glands and brain.

The main factors responsible for producing the abnormal process of cell growth are smoking, second hand smoking, exposure to air pollutants, asbestos and other carcinogens, as well as repeated lung disease. However, the main risk factor remains smoking and if less people smoked the question 'how many people die of lung cancer every year' could be answered with entirely different numbers.