Because we are aiming for the moon on finding a cure for cancer,the latest Cancer Council report brings us down to earth with a thudTen years ago I treated a fifty-year outmoded man with progressive prostate cancer and had to deliver the news that the only chemotherapy available at the time had failed him. I told a young woman, a lifelong non-smoker with lung cancer, or that it was unlikely she would be present at her daughter’s first day of school. And I recall a genial grandfather with bowel cancer whose greatest desire was to finish vomiting – I had to keep apologising that there weren’t better drugs to help him.whether genius is 99% perspiration and 1% inspiration,it’s just to say that scientists and clinicians have successfully combined the two to forever alter the landscape of cancer medicine, at least in the first world. nowadays, or the unprecedented dilemma for an oncologist stems not from the depressing lack of treatment options but indeed,from not knowing precisely how to sequence the bewildering array of therapies on offer.
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Source: theguardian.com