All About Cancer: PET Scans Play an Important Role in Its Treatment

Numerous medical advances now allow doctors to detect the early stages of illnesses before they get worse, including cancer, with the introduction of the PET scan. A PET scan uses Positron Emission Tomography (PET) to detect whether there are any cancerous tumors in the body.

Radioactive glucose is given by IV that cancerous growths synthesize very easily, leading doctors to detect both the cancerous growths and whether they have spread to other organs elsewhere in your body.

Determining the Stage of Cancer

Another one of the advantages of using these scans is providing more accurate staging for any cancer found. Doctors reading the scans have a clearer picture of the size of the tumors, as well as which treatments are best suited to the type of cancer involved.

Knowing the exact location of the tumor helps ensure that the medical team will treat cancer and help prevent it from coming back. When radiation therapy is used as a course of treatment, the beams must have very precise placement for maximum effectiveness.

Indicating the Effectiveness of a Treatment

PET scans, because of their ability to help with staging and determining if cancer has metastasized, can be good indicators of a treatment's effectiveness. Another advantage of these scans is their ability to determine if treatment is effective.

Repeated PET scans can prove quite effective for monitoring the size of a tumor. This type of scan provides a much clear image than many other scans do for cancer patients. Today, PET scans have helped doctors mitigate the life-threatening effects of cancer to a patient’s body, allowing them to take the first step in living a cancer-free life.