Week 6 Revision Flashcards
Define cancer
Abnormal cells growing uncontrollably, which can then form a tumor. This can grow and spread to other tissue within the body
List two ways to reduce the risk of cancer
- Maintain a healthy weight
- Be physically active
Cancer can be caused by genetic damage, list 2 different causes of genetic damage
1) Cigarette smoking
2) Lack of fruit and veg
What are two different catogories of lung cancer?
1) Small cell lung cancer
2) Non small cell lung cancer
What is proto-oncogenes?
Promotes growth within the body. Sometimes they can get stuck to be constantly working, this will cause the cell to replicate when the body does not need it to - this is when cancer starts.
What is tumour suppressor genes?
When a proto-oncegenes is stuck on, the tumour supresssor gene stops the replicating cell. This stop the cancer from mutiplying and spreading
What is apoptosis?
When the tumour suppresor genes tell a replicating cell to kill itself so it does not cause harm to the other cells. The cell will slowly start to give out the good parts, such as nutrients, to other cells, resulting in the cell getting smaller, and then eventually it is fully gone
How does HPV affect tumour suppressor genes?
It causes these genes to not work, therefore the cancerous tumour does not die, so it will start to replicate and spread
Cancer cells have high energy requirments, and need a lot of nutrients. What do the cells do to ensure they get these requirments?
The cancer cells creates new blood vessels to ensure they get teh nutrients.
How does a cancer cell spread? What is this called?
A caner cell wants to spread around the body, therefore some of the cell will break off and travel around the body, and attach itself to a new tissue - this is called secondary cancer
What are the two different types of treatment for cancer?
1) Surgery > to remove the tumour
2) Radiotherapy > to kill the cancer cells
Explain how anti-cancer medication harms healthy cells and cancer cells
The drug will be administered, which will then kill any cell which is replicating (not only cancer cells) > healthy cells can replicate faster than cancer cells, therefore they recover > another dose of medication is given, but the cancer cells have no had enough time to recover > this process repeats until the cancer cells die > a healthy cell can only replicate so many times before it dies, therefore there is still going to be death of a healthy cells, which then makes the patient ill
What is a new therapy used to treat cancer? Explain
Biological therapy is medication to boost the immune system, OR it will make the cancer cells visible to the immune system, allowing the immune system to see it and fight it. The drug might bind to the cancer cells receptors which then sends off red flags > THIS WILL NOT KILL ALL CELLS ONLY CANCER CELLS, therefore you wont have your healthy cells dying, but you’ll still get sick because your immune system has been activated
What two things does a patient of cancer die from?
Secondary cancer
Complications of cancer or its treatment
When does cachexia affect a patient?
This disorder tends to affect people who are the final stages of serious diseases such as HIV or AIDS, COPD, kidney disease and cognitive heart failure.
