Cervical Cancer Treatment Options

[Aviatorhi]

So yesterday I was hanging out with a girl I know and she gets a phone call out of the blue - long story short, she goes outside and then she comes into the room from the balcony and simply says "I have cervical cancer, doctor said don't worry and go to Chonburi Cancer Hospital on Monday - how can I not worry?". Well, I've known her a while and don't have much else to do and she's terrifyingly young to get such a sinister disease so I'd like to give her the best odds of survival.h

 

What do contributors have to offer as far as advice? I'm lucky myself and have never been in a hospital for anything more than my annual physical "body scan". So I'm completely out of my depth here. Most advice I've found is that the Chomburi hospital is poorly staffed and private hospital will likely be much better. But I genuinely don't know. 

[Sheryl]

The treatment and prognosis both depend on  the cancer stage.  Early stage cervical cancer is very curable. 

 

Depending on stage of the cancer, tteatment may be as simple as cauterization of the cervix (a onetime outpatient procedure) or may involve surgery with or without radiation.

 

Whether of not the woman wants to preserve fertility is a treatment consideration along with the cancer stage.

 

While government cancer  hospitals are low on comforts/amemities and crowded, they usually provide a good quality of care snd there is no medical advantage to going private. In addition it would be extremely expensive and carry a greater risk of unnecessary treatment/ overtreatment

 

 

[Lorry]

It's not at all sure she has cancer already,  it may just as well be a precursor to cancer, eg a pathological PAP smear. Most girls will not differentiate (and won't understand the difference anyway), but the difference in treatment and outcome is huge.

She should go to Chonburi Cancer Hospital as suggested,  at least for further diagnostics, and probably get the treatment there,  too.

It doesn't make sense at all to go to a private hospital at this stage,  as Sheryl said.

[Aviatorhi]

Thanks for the info. Will go to Chonburi on Monday and see how things go from there. 

[Aviatorhi]

To give you an update on how this went. They took the biopsy, came back ten days later HSV1. Thank whoever for that. But the seems the doc who made the initial call mustve really felt the need to get her in for a check so decided to scare her since she had a previous abnormality she didn't follow up on. 

[Sheryl]

26 minutes ago, Aviatorhi said:

To give you an update on how this went. They took the biopsy, came back ten days later HSV1. Thank whoever for that. But the seems the doc who made the initial call mustve really felt the need to get her in for a check so decided to scare her since she had a previous abnormality she didn't follow up on. 

Or just stressed thst this can be pre--cancerous and she heard only the word cancer.

[dddave]

Sheryl:  I know they have HPV immunization injections for mid-teen girls.  What is the current age cut-off for effectiveness?

[Sheryl]

On 10/14/2024 at 9:42 AM, dddave said:

Sheryl:  I know they have HPV immunization injections for mid-teen girls.  What is the current age cut-off for effectiveness?

The recommended age for vaccination is 11 or 12 but can be later provided the girl is not yet sexually active.

 

It needs to be given prior to exposure. 

[Lorry]

13 hours ago, dddave said:

Sheryl:  I know they have HPV immunization injections for mid-teen girls.  What is the current age cut-off for effectiveness?

Should be given BEFORE puberty, definitely before mid-teens (by then,  many girls are sexually active)

It needs to be  given before exposure,  but not every sexual activity is necessarily an exposure (not every man has HPV).

That's why there is no clear cut-off date, and it may still be given to 25 year-olds.

Of course,  if the girl had started to work as a prostitute without condoms at age 12, there is no point of a vaccine when she is 25.

[Aviatorhi]

On 10/13/2024 at 5:30 PM, Sheryl said:

Or just stressed thst this can be pre--cancerous and she heard only the word cancer.

After discussion with her it was called "pre cancerous" a year ago - she was aware of the difference and the reason she went from "I'll deal with it later" to "can you drive me on monday?". As with most similar stories I've read here, she went from feeling regret to relief to "never delaying that again".