The federal government has underscored the importance of early cancer detection, saying the stage at which the disease is diagnosed determines the treatment approach and chances of cure.
Uchechukwu Nwokwu, National Coordinator, National Cancer Control Plan (NCCP), Federal Ministry of Health and Social Welfare, said this in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on Sunday in Abuja.
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Mr Nwokwu also explained how cancer progresses through four stages, adding that it is not a single disease but a group of diseases that could affect different organs and behave differently depending on the type of cancer and the cells from which it originated.
According to him, cancer begins when abnormal cells develop within a particular organ or body system, with the extent of spread determining its stage.
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He said Stage One cancer referred to a disease that remained within the area where it originated and had not spread beyond that location.
“When the cancer may arise from a small cell inside the organ of a particular system of the body, and as long as it is within the area it originated, it is an early stage, stage one,” he said.
Mr Nwokwu said Stage Two occurs when the cancer has moved beyond its original area but remains confined within the affected organ.
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He explained that Stage Three is when the disease has grown beyond the affected organ but remains within the same body system or surrounding region.
“For example, if a breast cancer is growing beyond the breast and affects the chest wall, which is hosting the breast, that’s Stage Three,” he said.
The coordinator said Stage Four is the most advanced stage, occurring when the cancer has spread from the original organ to other systems or distant parts of the body.
He said such a spread is known as metastasis.
“So when it leaves the whole of where it’s growing, it’s a different system, we call it metastasis. That’s stage four,” he said.
Mr Nwokwu explained that breast cancer, for instance, could spread to the brain, bones, liver or lungs, with tests showing that a tumour in those locations originated from the breast.
He said Stage Four cancer is particularly difficult to manage because treatment is no longer focused solely on the original organ.
“So that means you can see breast cancer affecting some in the brain. You can see a tumour in the brain that’s actually from the breast,” he said.
Mr Nwokwu said the stage at which cancer is detected has significant implications for treatment and the possibility of achieving a cure.
He explained that some stage one cancers could potentially be cured through surgery alone because the disease remained confined to its site of origin.
“If you have somebody who has a breast cancer in stage one, like I said, it’s still within where it started from,” he said.
“You might just cut off that place and do a surgery that can just take a small part of the normal tissue where it has not affected, and with that surgery alone, the person is completely cured of that cancer.”
According to him, surgery can also be effective for some stage two cancers because the disease remains confined to the organ.
He said stage two and stage three cancers could, however, require combinations of treatment, including surgery, chemotherapy and radiotherapy.
Mr Nwokwu explained that doctors could also use what is known as neoadjuvant or adjuvant therapy alongside surgery, depending on the patient’s condition.
He said targeted therapy is another treatment option for cancers driven by particular hormones or biological mechanisms.
The coordinator cited prostate cancer as an example, explaining that some patients could undergo removal of the testes to reduce testosterone, a hormone that could stimulate the growth of prostate cancer.
He, however, noted that some advanced prostate cancers could become resistant to this approach, a condition known as castration-resistant prostate cancer, requiring other medicines to control disease progression.
Mr Nwokwu said treatment of stage four cancer is more complex because the disease could involve several parts of the body.
He explained that chemotherapy could be useful in some circumstances because it is a systemic treatment that can reach cancer cells throughout the body.
He, however, said that radiotherapy had to be applied more selectively depending on where the cancer had spread and the patient’s overall condition.
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Mr Nwokwu emphasised that the differences in treatment across the stages reinforced the importance of detecting cancer early, before it spreads beyond the organ where it originated.
He said early diagnosis allowed doctors to determine the stage of the disease and select the most appropriate combination of treatment modalities.
The coordinator also emphasised that cancer treatment should be individualised because cancers affecting the same organ could behave differently depending on their biological characteristics.
He urged Nigerians to seek medical attention promptly when they notice unusual symptoms and to follow appropriate screening and diagnostic recommendations to improve the chances of detecting cancer at an early stage.
(NAN)
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