Christopher S Gondi

Department of Internal Medicine, University of Illinois College of Medicine at Peoria, Peoria, IL, USA

*Corresponding Author: Christopher S Gondi, Department of Internal Medicine, University of Illinois College of Medicine at Peoria, Peoria, IL, USA.

Received: July 18, 2018; Published: July 28, 2018

Citation: Christopher S Gondi. “Pancreatic Cancer Treatment- Search for the Elusive Silver Bullet ". Acta Scientific Cancer Biology 2.6 (2018).

  Pancreatic Ductal Adeno Carcinoma (PDAC) is the fourth most common cause of cancer deaths in the United States and is gaining importance worldwide as the survival rates are very poor for all four stages combined. The combined 1-year survival is only about 25% and the 5-year survival is less than 8%. It has been often observed that PDAC tumors reoccur after surgery and chemotherapy. These new tumors tend to be chemo-resistant, leading to poor survival rates, which have not changed in the last 40 years. A major hallmark of pancreatic cancer is extensive local tumor invasion, early systemic dissemination, and extremely poor response to chemotherapy. The basis for these adverse characteristics is not well understood. Identifying the mechanisms involved in chemoresistance and tumor recurrence will enable the development of better strategies to combat this disease.

  One of the main reasons why pancreatic cancer is so deadly is that by the time it is diagnosed it usually is too late. Unlike other cancers such as lung and colon, which present numerous symptoms, pancreatic cancer at an early stage shows almost no symptoms. Symptoms can be as common as abdominal pain, weight loss, and loss of appetite; because the symptoms are so common it is very difficult to determine whether a person has pancreatic cancer or something else. Constant persistent symptoms accompanied by more severe indications such as jaundice is usually when a patient realizes that something is wrong.

Copyright: © 2018 Christopher S Gondi. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.