What is oncology?
Oncology is the branch of medicine that researches, identifies and treats cancer and deals with the prevention, diagnosis, and treatment of cancer
The field of oncology has three major areas: medical, surgical, and radiation.
What is Medical Oncology?
Medical Oncology is a modality of treatment in cancer care which uses Chemotherapy, Immunotherapy, Hormonal Therapy and Targeted Therapy to treat cancer in an effective manner. Medical Oncology is usually works in conjunction with Surgical Oncology or Radiation Oncology to give the best clinical outcomes.
Chemotherapy:
Chemotherapy is a type of cancer treatment that uses drugs to destroy cancer cells
Immunotherapy:
Immunotherapy is a breakthrough innovation in Cancer Care. Immunotherapy is the process of activating the immune cells to fight against cancer cells it is a personalised treatment which intends to enhance the body’s defence mechanism to combat and destroy cancer cells.
Targeted Therapy:
Targeted therapy is a cancer treatment that uses drugs and is completely different from the traditional chemotherapy. The modality known as targeted therapy helps in stopping the cancer from growing and spreading to other organs. They work in a pattern of targeting the specific genes or proteins.
Hormone Therapy:
Some cancers use hormones to grow or develop, which means the cancer is hormone sensitive or hormone dependent. Hormone therapy for cancer uses medicines to block or reduce the amount of hormones in the body to stop or slow down the growth of cancer.
Cancers that can be hormone sensitive include:
- Breast Cancer
- Prostate Cancer
- Ovarian Cancer
- Uterine Cancer (also called Endometrial Cancer).
What is surgical oncology?
Surgical oncology is the branch of surgery applied to oncology; it focuses on the surgical management of tumors, especially cancerous tumors. As one of several modalities in the management of cancer, the specialty of surgical oncology has evolved in steps similar tomedical oncology(pharmacotherapy for cancer), which grew out of hematology, and radiation oncology, which grew out of radiology.
A surgical oncologist removes the tumor and nearby tissue during surgery. He or she also performs certain types of biopsies to help diagnose cancer.
