Through a television advertisement or a promo before the beginning of a movie, it has become common knowledge that smoking is injurious to health and causes mouth & lung cancers. While these are great mediums of spreading awareness among people about the ill effects of smoking on human health, we all know the population of smokers is not settling.
As a result, there is a rising influx of patients suffering from lung cancers, seeking different diagnoses & treatments across different corners of the world. As prevailing as cancer is becoming, lung cancer is a prominent cause of death from cancers worldwide, wherein NSCLC is its most commonly occurring type, i.e., seen in over 80% of lung cancer patients. And with such a massive patient pool, the Global Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer (NSCLC) Market is projected to observe around 11.2% CAGR between 2022 & 2027, cites a recent research study by MarkNtel Advisors. Let us have a look at different forms of Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer:
Adenocarcinomas are a type of NSCLC that originates in the cells that secrete substances like mucus and are extensively seen in people who smoke or used to smoke. However, since the population of smokers is rising, passive smoking is also becoming common and showing cases of Adenocarcinomas in non-smokers as well.
Besides, Adenocarcinomas are more likely to be in women than in men and are very prominent to find in the younger generations. While this cancer is usually found in the outer parts of the lungs, Adenocarcinomas are also easy to detect before it has spread. What gives a light of hope in patients with Adenocarcinomas than others are the possibility of better outcomes with appropriate treatment.
Squamous cells are a line of flat cells that are lined on the inside of lung airways. The prominent cause of this lung cancer is a history of smoking. Squamous Cells Carcinoma NSCLC is usually found in the central parts of the lungs, around the bronchus.
The thing with Large Cell Carcinoma is its possibility of appearing anywhere in the lungs. What is actually scary is its tendency of growing & spreading quickly, as it makes different treatments very difficult to work on.
Different Types of Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer Treatments
As developments in the field of Oncology are swiftly gaining pace and offering different treatments to cure cancers, including NSCLC, the large influx of patients is demonstrating an upsurging demand for these therapies. The most prominent kinds of treatments for NSCC are:
The type of treatment used on each patient depends upon the health condition, the tumor growth & stage, among other such parameters. The primary goal of doctors is to treat cancer, stay ahead of the symptoms, and offer the utmost comfort to the patients. Therefore, your doctor might suggest taking therapies either individually or multiple treatments in combination for efficacy & safety. Yet, again, it all depends upon the health condition of the NSCLC patient.
Let us read a little about a few prominent treatments used for NSCLC among patients across different corners of the world.
Chemotherapy is one of the most extensively used treatment methods among NSCLC patients across different corners of the world. This therapy used drugs that travel throughout the body and kills cancer. Depending upon the case, the doctor might put the drugs in the spinal fluid to target cancer, particularly in the area. Oftentimes, chemo is done before surgery to reduce the tumor size, making the surgery more effective.
Immunotherapy exhibits the use of drugs to strengthen & direct the immune system of the patient to identify & kill the cancer cells effectively. Drugs like immune checkpoint inhibitors turn the immune system on to targeting the cancer cells directly & attacking potentially harmful agents in the body. The variety of PD-1 inhibitors used for therapy are Nivolumab & Pembrolizumab, for PD-L1 are Atezolizumab, Avelumab, & Durvalumab, and for CTLA-4 is Ipilimumab.
If an NSCLC patient has been diagnosed with cancer during the early stages, the oncologist is pretty likely to recommend surgery to remove cancer. In this situation, a part or maybe the whole lung could be removed.
Either alone or in combination, Radiation therapy is performed on NSCLC patients in case the cancer is not entirely removed after surgery. This therapy is also practiced to eliminate the presence of any cancer that might have missed the doctor's eyes in the surgery. Radiation Therapy uses a high-energy beam aimed at the cancer cells using a special machine, either from outside the body or internally using a radioactive substance that is put near cancer.
The drugs used in targeted therapy are directed principally to identify & kill only the cancer cells and limit the growth & spread to other parts of the body. When compared with Chemotherapy & radiation therapy, targeted therapy is more likely to cause less damage to the healthy cells.
With growing developments in medical science and the rising availability of effective diagnoses & therapeutics, the world is witnessing a massive influx of cancer patients seeking treatments. Governments & prominent players in the industry are increasingly investing in enhancing development & distribution capacities to cater to these high unmet needs of patients worldwide. These aspects will lead the Global Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer (NSCLC) Market to observe significant growth in the years to come.
