Wednesday, July 1, 2015

Basics of Cancer

Again, this is just a quick post. The main focus of these two questions appears to be simply defining some of the key terms when talking about cancer.

1. Why is the word potential important in defining the characteristics of invasion and metastases in cancerous tissue?

One of the characteristics of cancer is that it has the potential to invade and metastasise. Not all cancers invade or metastasise but the cancerous cells do need to have the ability to potentially break through the basement membrane of tissues to be considered cancer. Or something. It seems like a bit of a weird definition to me.

2. What is the difference between primary cancers and metastatic cancer?

This one is a bit easier to answer! Primary cancer is the first cancer that appears, while metastatic cancer refers to cancer that has spread around the body from its origin. For example, you can have breast cancer that metastasises to the ovaries. In this case, breast cancer is the primary cancer, while the cancer in the ovaries is metastatic.

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