How We Treat Stomach Cancer

Surgery is the most common treatment approach, especially when the illness is at an early stage. The goal of surgery is to take out the cancer as well as a slight edge of healthy tissue around the tumor. In some cases, all or part of the stomach may be removed, depending on the location and size of the stomach cancer. In order to ensure that all cancer has been removed, surgery may also be used to take out lymph nodes that haven’t gotten better with other treatments.

If the doctor removes all of your stomach, he or she will reconnect your digestive tract so that you can eat.

Learn more about overall cancer surgery.

Radiation therapy uses high-energy X-rays to kill or shrink cancer cells. Your doctor may use internal or external radiation, or both, to treat your cancer. This treatment can be used to shrink a tumor before surgery, kill cancer cells that remain in the area after surgery, target tumors that can’t be removed with surgery, or treat cancer if you cannot have surgery.

Learn more overall radiation therapy.

Chemotherapy uses powerful medicines, either given through a vein or taken as pills, to kill cancer cells all through the body. Chemo is given in rounds, followed by a break; treatment can last for months. Chemo may be used to shrink a tumor before surgery or to kill any cancer cells that remain after local treatments, depending on the size of the cancer. It may also treat tumors that have grown in other places in the body. Cancers that have spread are usually treated with chemotherapy.

Learn more about overall chemotherapy.

Targeted therapy drugs target the changes in cells that cause cancer cells to form. These drugs affect the cancer cells in your body and leave your normal cells alone. This treatment course sometimes works when standard chemotherapy drugs don’t, and they often have different (and less severe) side effects. Targeted therapy drugs come as pills that you take at home.

Your doctor may suggest using this therapy in combination with chemotherapy or radiation therapy. This is especially true if your cancer has stopped responding to radiation or chemotherapy care.