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Disadvantages of Radiation Therapy
Radiation therapy is used as a treatment to shrink cancerous growths within the
body. It works by affecting the cancerous cells ability to divide, which
ultimately destroys the tumor. Despite the disadvantages of radiation therapy,
it can be a very successful technique of treating tumors and prolonging the life
of the patient and it is usually the preferred method of treatment when the
cancer is in the early stages or surgery is not an option.
One of the main disadvantages of radiation therapy is that it is not selective
about which cells it attacks and it can destroy healthy cells as well as
cancerous cells. This leads to unpleasant side-effects during treatment, which
can be very distressing.
Hair loss is one of the widely recognized disadvantages of radiation therapy.
The treatment not only affects the hair on the head, it can lead to the loss of
all body hair and is often one of the most traumatic side effects of the
treatment.
As well as hair loss, the radiation therapy can cause severe skin irritation,
redness, skin lesions, and peeling. Patients often suffer fatigue as a result of
the body expending energy trying to replace the cells that are killed during
treatment. Other nasty side effects include a difficulty in swallowing and a
reduction in appetite. The patient is also more susceptible to infection as a
result of the radiation treatment.
Side effects can take around two or three weeks to manifest themselves and many
problems are restricted to the area of treatment. However, most patients
experience problems with urination and bowel movements, rectal bleeding, and in
men, erectile dysfunction.
Another major disadvantage of radiation therapy is that in the case of larger
tumors, the cells at the centre of the mass are often unaffected by the
radiation, whereas cells on the outside of the tumor usually killed fairly
quickly. This can sometimes obscure the extent of the tumor and lead to problems
if surgery is subsequently performed.
Radiation therapy can be very time consuming. The treatment itself only lasts
for a few minutes, but it needs to repeated five days per week and the whole
course of treatment will normally last between four and five weeks. Radiation
therapy is not an instant treatment like surgery as it can take several weeks
before it is effective.
However, radiation therapy can be very effective on some types of cancer,
especially in the early stages.