Desmoplastic Mesothelioma is a complicated type of asbestos cancer which is difficult to diagnose. Desmoplastic Mesothelioma looks like pleurisy and benign fibrous tumors. This can result in diagnosis of the disease been missed or delayed. The survive rate of Desmoplastic cancer victims are very poor. Due to associated extensive collagen fibrosis, Desmoplastic cancer is generally difficult to differentiate from reactive pleural fibrosis. Desmoplastic mesothelioma, as a variant of diffuse sarcomatoid mesothelioma, develops tumors. These can be malignant
Diagnosising Desmoplastic Mesothelioma
If an X-ray or CT scan indicates signs that you indeed may have abdominal cancer, a biopsy is conducted, allowing the physician to determine the malignancy level.
To detect a desmoplastic variant of mesothelioma of the pleura and its association with asbestos exposure, autopsy analyses of fibrous pleurisy is necessary.
Although desmoplastic mesothelioma is a very rare form of mesothelioma, it is very aggressive compared to the basic form of the disease – epithelial mesothelioma. Not only can it infect tissue and organs, but it also has the ability attack parts of the body that are difficult to treat such as bone, muscle, cartilage, and fat.Thus it can be very difficult to diagnose, and is often misdiagnosed as benign fibrous tissue. Due to the aggressiveness and common misdiagnosis of desmoplastic mesothelioma, it is a very lethal and dangerous disease.
Survival Rates of Desmoplastic Mesothelioma
Desmoplastic mesothelioma survival rates are some of the worst, partly due to the problems associated with diagnosing the disease, but also the number of patients diagnosed with the disease each year is one of the smallest. Doctors advise to use the same mesothelioma diet programs in order to allow the immune system to help the drugs and other treatment methods towards curing the disease.
Treatments
Any Desmoplastic Mesothelioma cancer treatment is dependent of the stage of the cancer, location and sizes of any tumors and age and health of the patient. Desmoplastic mesothelioma patients respond to the same treatment methods that are used to cure the most common types of the disease:
- Chemotherapy
- Surgery
- Radiation Therapy
Desmoplastic Malignant Mesothelioma is also known as a form of diffuse mesothelioma, and is only found in ten percent of diffuse mesothelioma cases. Because of the asbestos fibers, the pleura is affected, thickening itself and causing pleural effusion. This issue causes a lot of pain in the chest area for the desmoplastic mesothelioma patient. The build-up of fluid can be stopped by draining the excess liquid and treating the are with talc.
