CANCER TREATMENT.

Hawera Star, Volume XLVIII, 8 November 1924, Page 12

CANCER TREATMENT.

LIFE PROLONGED 10 YEARS

BY EARLY OPERATION

In. a prefatory note to a- report on cancer of the breast, issued by the British Ministry of Health, Sir George Newman, the chief medical officer of the Ministry, states that modern surgical treatment is a great improvement on that of a generation ago. The proportion of those who submit to early treatment, so as to give a good prospect of cure, is much too small in all countries, he says, and it is probable that popular ignorance is not the least factor in this delay The oart played by heredity is small. Of •5793 cases of cancer investigated only m 12.3 per cent, was heredity alleged. The report is the work' of Dr. Janet Lance-Claypon, who examined the literature of more than 25,000 cases. Her conclusions are: “The expectation of life wher© cancer of the breast is .allowed to run its own course is 3£ years from the onset An operation increases the expectation of life by 2 to 3 years in the aggregate of cases. When early operation is performed life is prolonged for 10 years or more.” A table on the results X-ravs after operation shows that of patients fully X-rayed 60 per cent, were alive three years after the operation and os? per cent, five years after The figures for patients not X-raved are T 9 and 36 per cent.