It is next to impossible to financially plan for cancer treatment.

Take one cancer scenario: EGFR-mutation-positive adenocarcinoma of the lung. This is one subset of lung cancer not uncommonly encountered.

In the US, 10,000 such cases are diagnosed each year; in the world, about 100,000.

In Malaysia, a guess estimate would be 800. The treatment of choice for this subset of lung cancer is either gefitinib or erlotinib.

The cost of treatment is RM10,000 a month (S$4,000). This covers the cost of the drug and other incidentals.

How long must the patient take this cancer drug? The answer is, “as long as the drug works”.

Which only begs the next question: “How long will the drug work?”

And this is the tricky part. In some patients, the drug is no longer effective after two months.

In about 5% of patients, the drug keeps the cancer in check for four years or more.

The rest lie in between.

You will have to budget between RM20,000 and RM480,000 for this treatment, for this particular cancer.

Take another scenario: metastatic cancer of the colon, K-RAS wild type.

Again, the number of patients with this cancer is not small, almost as many as the lung cancer subset we discussed.

Seminar after mind-numbing seminar, we are taught that the best results for patients with this subset of colon cancer are obtained if you use up all six effective drugs: 5-fluorouracil, leucovorin, irinotecan, oxaliplatin, cetuximab, and bevacizumab.

We are also taught that liver metastases (spread to the liver) should be resected whenever possible.

If we do our best for patients with this cancer, some will live for six months, and some other fortunate ones live four years or more.

And the cost of treatment? Between RM240,000 and RM1.5mil.

For more, read: Planning a budget for cancer treatment

Why waste all your hard-earned money on treatment with no guarantee results when you can fork out a small sum for your yearly health screening?… where chances of recovery are high when you catches cancer early…

It’s so easy for people to take the prescription the doctor wrote to have filled. It’s even easier to take a medication, hoping for a cure or relief from an illness. But there’s often a trade off. Too many times, medications have side effects that range from mild to dangerous to deadly.

Some people suffer so greatly that they are willing to take the risks, but what of the people who haven’t been properly informed? Here are some potential side effects from common prescription drugs that patients should watch out for:

Hypertension: It’s ironic that a common disorder that is often treated pharmacologically would also be caused by other drugs. However, it is true that there are many prescriptions that cause an increase in blood pressure. Some common drugs for fibromyalgia as well as anti-inflammatory medications (NSAIDs or non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs) and corticosteroids can cause hypertension. Untreated high blood pressure can lead to a host of other problems, such as cardiac arrest, stroke, and kidney failure.

Suicidal thoughts: Unfortunately, there are many drugs that can lead people to experience suicidal thoughts. Some of the medications are used to treat fibromyalgia, depression, anxiety, or help people with smoking cessation. Unfortunately, people who are experiencing depression might be prescribed a drug that simply makes it worse, and – it goes without saying – suicidal thoughts can often lead to suicide.

Liver damage: There are numerous drugs that can lead to liver damage, including medications used to treat epilepsy, high cholesterol (statin drugs), and pain and inflammation (again, NSAIDs). Untreated damage to the liver can lead to myriad problems, such as liver cancer, failure of the liver, and chronic liver disease.

Kidney damage: There are numerous prescription drugs on the market that can cause kidney damage. Some of them include chemotherapy drugs, antibiotics, and high blood pressure medications. Kidney damage that is untreated can lead to renal failure.

It’s tragic that when people trust their physician to make them well, they’re given a medication that can leave them worse off than when they started. Medications are not always safe, and people need to be aware of the potential dangerous and deadly side effects they could experience because they chose to blindly take something that was supposed to heal them.

Source: Natural News

You do not have to resort to medicine. Stay healthy simply means early detection and prevention. Come to MJLife for your regular health screening and see for yourself how your health can be managed.