Cancer, in medical terms, refers to malignant tumors originating in epithelial tissue and is the most common type of malignant tumor.

So why are we so afraid of cancer? Some dangers occur slowly and can be foreseen by patients, their families and doctors, who are able to take the necessary measures. Most of these patients, most of them are chronic in nature, lasting for a few days, weeks, months or even years, with gradual failure of one or more vital organs such as heart, lungs, kidneys, liver, brain, etc., inability to eat for a long period of time, very poor nutrition, severe pain, shortness of breath or weakness, and the person is getting weaker and weaker, wasting away, and finally dying. For example, liver cancer appears liver failure, liver coma death. Or there are uncontrollable infections of lungs, digestive tract, urinary system, etc., leading to death.

Some dangers occur suddenly, lasting from a few minutes to a few hours, for which the family may not be prepared at all, and for which it is difficult for doctors to take effective measures. Such as pulmonary embolism, this is a high incidence of cancer patients is very hidden but very dangerous complications, because the tumor or blood clots fall off to block the pulmonary artery caused by the prior may not have any signs, or some very atypical abnormality, once the occurrence of large-scale pulmonary embolism, fast a few minutes the patient is gone, slow only a few days. According to statistics, death from pulmonary embolism is the second leading cause of death for all cancer patients, and it is difficult to prevent, diagnose and treat. Unless the embolized pulmonary vessel is small and not very large. Another category of more common danger is hemorrhage, where cancer cells invade important blood vessels causing them to rupture and bleed so much that death from hemorrhagic shock or asphyxiation may occur within seconds to minutes if it progresses quickly, and there is no chance of resuscitation at all, even in the hospital. There are also some patients of high age, very weak or abnormal mentality, who are easy to be suffocated by feeding or drinking, or suffocate when sputum is stuck in the throat, and often die within minutes, so the patients, family members and medical personnel should take extra precautions.

Some patients suffer from other serious illnesses, such as heart disease, stroke and organ failure, which are inherently dangerous and can worsen or attack suddenly, leading to the patient’s death in a very short period of time. Although cancer is not the direct cause of death, cancer and these diseases often promote each other, work hand in hand, and accelerate each other’s death. Other conditions such as ruptured alveoli forming a pneumothorax, massive pleural fluid affecting respiratory function, pericardial effusion leading to pericardial tamponade, and cerebral edema leading to cerebral herniation can also be fatal within a short period of time (from minutes to days), and will not be repeated.

In conclusion, the risks faced by cancer patients are many, great, and at any time. It is not necessary that only patients with advanced stages are at risk of death, but it may also occur in many patients with early stages; not only the risk of cancer itself, but also other concomitant diseases may occur.

So, what kind of physical examination program is better for us? First of all, we have to understand what are the early symptoms of cancer? Early symptoms of cancer are generally categorized into two aspects: local manifestations and systemic symptoms.

Local manifestations of cancer:

Firstly, it will appear lumps, which are formed by malignant proliferation of cancer cells and can be touched with hands on the body surface or in the deep part of the body, and thyroid, parotid or breast cancer can be touched in the shallower part of the skin. Tumor metastasis to the lymph nodes will lead to enlargement of the lymph nodes. Certain superficial lymph nodes, such as the cervical lymph nodes and axillary lymph nodes, are easily palpable. As for those in deeper parts of the body, such as stomach cancer, pancreatic cancer, etc., they need to be pressed hard to be touched.

Secondly, there will be pain. The swelling growth of tumor or rupture, infection, etc., will make the peripheral nerves or nerve trunks be stimulated or compressed, and local pain may appear, and the appearance of pain often suggests that the cancer has entered into the middle or late stage, and the pain is mostly hidden pain or dull pain in the beginning, and it is more obvious at night.

Thirdly, ulcers will appear. Tumors on the surface of the body or gastrointestinal tract, if they grow too fast, can be necrotic due to insufficient blood supply, or form ulcers due to secondary infection.

Fourthly, there will be bleeding. Bleeding occurs when cancerous tissue invades blood vessels or small blood vessels of cancerous tissue rupture.

Fifth, there is obstruction. If the cancerous tissue grows rapidly and causes obstruction of cavity organs, when the obstruction site is in the respiratory tract, difficulty in breathing and pulmonary atelectasis may occur. If the esophagus is obstructed by esophageal cancer, it will lead to difficulty in swallowing and so on.

Sixth, systemic symptoms, early stage of tumor has no obvious systemic symptoms, some patients will have weight loss, loss of appetite, cachexia, profuse sweating, such as night sweating, anemia, fatigue and other non-specific symptoms.

Therefore, we can do these medical checkups to check our health status.

1、Low-dose CT scanning of the lungs is very useful for early screening of lung cancer, etc. Ultrasound is also very useful for early screening of breast cancer as well as thyroid cancer. Gastroscopy and colonoscopy are also very useful for the screening of digestive tract tumors. ultrasound combined with AFP test is a very useful test for the early diagnosis of primary liver cancer.

2、CA125 combined with ultrasound is very useful for ovarian cancer screening. If CA125 rises progressively in women of childbearing age or postmenopausal women, timely ovarian ultrasound is very useful for detecting ovarian cancer. In addition, the use of color Doppler imaging technology can clearly find out whether there are masses and lesions in most organs of the whole body.

3、Head CT or magnetic resonance imaging is also useful in detecting space-occupying lesions in the brain.

4、Blood test: Blood test is an important means to detect early cancer, and it is useful to detect whether the indicators of various tumor markers in blood are elevated or not, so as to find and identify various malignant tumors: AFP is useful to detect primary hepatocellular carcinoma, embryonic tumor of gonads, and carcinoembryonic antigen (CEA) is commonly found to be elevated when there is obvious elevation of colon cancer, gastric cancer, lung cancer, cholangiocarcinoma; and there is elevated elevation when there is cancer of the liver, breast, ovary, and pancreas.

5、Gynecological physical examination Pap smear: the detection rate of early cervical cancer is about 60%-70% by using Pap staining method.

6、Ultrasound.

7、X-ray chest radiograph: X-ray passes through the human body because organs and tissues have the same density and present the same image, thus directly displaying lung tumors and also searching for chest tumors through emphysema, obstructive pneumonia, pleural fluid and other indirect changes.

8、X-ray Chest: X-ray passes through the human body due to the density of organs and tissues presenting the same image, thus directly displaying lung tumors and also searching for thoracic tumors through the indirect changes such as emphysema, obstructive pneumonia, pleural fluid and so on.

9、Gastroscopy and enteroscopy: directly observe the color of gastric and intestinal mucosa, blood vessel texture, and the opening pattern of glands with naked eyes to identify whether there are lesions or not, and do biopsy to confirm the diagnosis of suspected lesions.

With the continuous development of modern medicine, more and more highly sophisticated technology is being applied to the prevention and treatment of cancer, and the best way to prevent cancer is to have a strong body as well as a full spirit.