Pancreatic Cancer

Survivors of Pancreatic cancer celebrate during the month of November. Loved ones also honor those individuals who lost the battle to Pancreatic cancer. Bringing awareness to pancreatic cancer helps those facing a diagnosis as well as offers a promise that the battle of finding a cure will not be given up. Through pancreatic awareness during the month of November the truth of the cancer is being shared and those suffering can come together.

While bringing awareness is the goal the hope is to find a new path that will lead to prevention and cure pancreatic cancer. The message of Never Giving Up as well as the right to Demand Better lead the battle charge. Each year more than 50,000 Americans will be diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. For more than 40,000 the diagnosis is also a death sentence. The number of deaths related to Pancreas Cancer surpasses those related to Breast cancer. That number is expected to grow in the coming years

Pancreatic Cancer survival rates have not improved in the past 40 years. With the highest number of deaths caused by cancer the diagnosis is not a welcome one. Within the first year following diagnosis 2/3 of the patients will die. Unlike other cancers that we can safeguard against the risk factors of pancreatic cancer are not well known.

Smoking cigarettes still is gifted with the risk of pancreatic cancer as well. Other factors that may lead to pancreatic cancer include:

• family history
• chronic pancreatitis
• alcohol use
•  obesity and diabetes

Pancreatic cancer may begin as abdomen or gastrointestinal issues. Later other symptoms will develop. Some of the known symptoms include:

• abdominal or back pain
• weight loss
• jaundice
• loss of appetite
• nausea
• stool changes 

Surgery is perhaps the largest known treatment for pancreatic cancer patients. Radiation therapy as well as chemotherapy often follow up surgery. While these are treatments they are not cures. 

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