Corel Medical Series: Cancer/Corel Medical Series: Cancer.iso/mac/Program/c14b.dxr/00066_Field_SRC.c14b.C.16.txt

Text File | 1997-01-28 | 2KB | 18 lines

• Minimum therapy for low-grade malignancies of a portion of the parotid gland is a superficial parotidectomy.
  Great care is taken to preserve the facial nerve that goes through the middle of this gland and controls the
  muscles on that side of the face. This surgery is very delicate.
      For other kinds of parotid tumors, a total parotidectomy is needed to obtain a safe margin around the tumor
  because it frequently grows microscopically far beyond where it is visible to the surgeon.
• Postoperative radiotherapy is being used more and more, especially for lesions that are high grade or have close
  margins.
• There is no established role for chemotherapy , but it is sometimes used in special circumstances when radiation
  or surgery are refused, or for recurrent or unresponsive tumors.
• In high-grade cancer, radiation therapy is almost always added. The surgery is often more extensive and may
  require removal of the facial nerve, but the combined approach may permit preservation of the nerve.
• When the tumor has spread to lymph nodes in the neck, an additional operation—called a radical neck
  dissection—is needed to remove these nodes. One possible result is a drooped shoulder, as well as a flattening
  of the side of the neck. Sometimes radiotherapy is used to treat the neck.
• Chemotherapy is sometimes considered when surgery or radiotherapy are refused or have already been used as
  much as they can be. Prospects for cure in this situation are low, and prolonging life is the goal of therapy.
• For patients whose disease has spread beyond the neck, no curative treatment is available.