Don’t be afraid of cancer anymore. Cancer can be prevented and treated! The key lies in these two points

When it comes to cancer, everyone is "terrified". No one wants themselves, their loved ones or their friends to get cancer. This is a very heavy topic, and we will spend a lot of manpower, material resources, and even a lot of money.

Today we are going to talk to you about “precancerous lesions”.

What are precancerous lesions?

"Precancerous lesions" is a term from English. As the name suggests, it refers to the lesions before the tumor occurs, that is, the inevitable stage of normal tissue from normal cells to cancer . If we can detect and prevent it from further deteriorating at this stage, it is possible to move the threshold of cancer treatment forward and strangle it in the cradle .

Precancerous lesions are not equal to cancer. Although precancerous lesions have the word "cancer" in their name, they are not any malignant tumors, but a disease that has the potential to become cancer . Therefore, even if we find it, we don't have to panic too much, because the process from a normal cell to a cancer cell is a long and chronic process.

The World Health Organization (WHO) also tells us that one-third of cancers can be cured through early detection and early treatment . Even if we find precancerous lesions, we can effectively prevent them from becoming early cancer, advanced cancer, or even advanced cancer. Therefore, everyone should not be afraid of cancer.

What are precancerous lesions?

You may be very concerned about what precancerous lesions are. Next, let's guess whether these three lesions are precancerous lesions.

①Chronic superficial gastritis

② Cervical erosion

③ Black moles on the body

In fact, these three are not precancerous lesions . For example, chronic superficial gastritis. If we don’t pay attention to what we eat or have been under some stress recently, we will most likely have some superficial gastritis after a gastroscopy. So in this case, as long as we pay attention to our eating habits and keep a good mood , this gastritis will be completely cured . You can take a look at the following lesions. They are the precancerous lesions we just talked about, such as the precancerous lesions of gastric cancer - chronic atrophic gastritis, the precancerous lesions of intestinal cancer - intestinal metaplastic adenomatous polyps... These are the next step. After a certain period of time, they may become early cancer or mid-to-late stage gastric cancer . For example, breast hyperplasia, severe breast hyperplasia, and breast cystic hyperplasia in women are also precancerous lesions.

So we need to have regular checkups . At the same time, if these conditions are confirmed, we must change our lifestyle in a targeted way. This can prevent its further development and even reverse the outcome of some precancerous lesions.

How to screen for precancerous lesions?

So how do you screen for precancerous lesions? Let's take a look at these three high-risk factors:

1. Age

We know that cancer is, in a sense, an old age disease. As our lifespans get longer and our living standards improve, our chances of getting cancer will increase because it increases in a linear relationship with our age .

2. Family history

An important step in screening for precancerous lesions is to know your family history and ask your parents if any family members have a family history of cancer. If your immediate family members, such as your parents, grandparents, brothers and sisters, have cancer, especially digestive tract cancer, your own chance of getting cancer will be several times higher than that of other friends.

3. Lifestyle and eating habits

Some lifestyles and bad eating habits, such as drinking very hot porridge frequently, will increase the chances of esophageal and gastric mucosal cancer. So we should have good eating habits, eat more fruits and vegetables , eat less high-fat and high-oil foods at night, and eat more whole grains. At the same time, try to eat less processed foods, fast foods, canned foods, and foods with additives that may increase the risk of cancer.

In addition to these, do we have any special means to screen for precancerous lesions or do precancerous lesions have any symptoms? In fact, I can tell you with great regret that most precancerous lesions may not have any symptoms . For example, atypical hyperplasia of the stomach may not have any symptoms, and even gastric cancer may not have typical symptoms in the middle stage. So it is unrealistic to wait for the symptoms of precancerous lesions to appear before conducting examinations and treatments.

Therefore, we need to know some of our own conditions. Even if we do not have any high-risk factors, we should know that we need to have an annual physical examination when we reach a certain age, such as when we are over 45 years old . There is a joke that it is a hooligan if a physical examination does not include a gastrointestinal endoscopy, so we also recommend that everyone should add a gastrointestinal endoscopy to the physical examination when they are 45 years old.

When it comes to gastroscopy, everyone may have a fear. In fact, there are many types of gastroscopy . If you reach a certain age or have some stomach discomfort, you must undergo a gastroscopy. We have different types, such as painless gastroscopy . The anesthesiologist will give you some anesthetic sedatives, so you can have a good sleep and complete the gastroscopy. There are also capsule endoscopes and magnetically controlled capsule endoscopes , which are like a drug capsule. After you take a sip of water and swallow the capsule, you can completely record the image of the entire digestive tract through a small camera. If we see suspicious lesions during gastroscopy, we can use other more high-tech technologies, such as staining endoscopes and fluorescent endoscopes , which can be used to magnify and stain these superficial tissues in various ways to observe and discover suspicious lesions.

In addition to gastroscopy, there are also small biopsy forceps that can remove a few pieces of suspicious lesions for pathological histological examination . The pathologist will magnify the processed pathological sections dozens or hundreds of times under the microscope and even use some other special stains to lock in the early precancerous lesions . Confirming the diagnosis can provide good physical evidence for the next step of intervention and treatment.

How to prevent precancerous lesions?

Emotional changes can affect the hypothalamus, and through the humoral system and nervous system, bring about changes in some factors of the immune state of the whole body. I often say that stomach problems are mostly "mental illnesses". This mental illness is "mental illness" in quotation marks. In other words, many stomach symptoms are closely related to our emotions. Let's take a simple example. If two people argue about something, they point at each other's noses and argue, slam the table and glare at each other. Then they immediately ask you to eat and put a bowl of braised pork on the table. Do you want to eat it? Why don't you want to eat it? No appetite......

Therefore, mental changes are closely related to the occurrence of tumors . Everyone must have a happy mood. Not all of us will encounter happy things, but we must find ways to adjust ourselves to a happy state , which is very important for tumor prevention . A healthy lifestyle can keep us away from cancer.

Everyone knows that gastric cancer is a typical lifestyle cancer . Even if we do not have genetic factors, we may develop tumors if we eat too much, drink a lot, smoke, stay up late, etc.

Therefore, the advice that we should quit smoking, limit alcohol consumption, eat a healthy diet, have a regular work and rest schedule, and not sit for too long has been supported by certain scientific research.

If we are unfortunate enough to have precancerous lesions and have been diagnosed, there is no need to panic . As long as the precancerous lesions are treated scientifically and we pay attention to our lifestyle and have a regular diet, exercise, life and work, we will have a better life .

I believe that in the future, through everyone's joint efforts and through the public's awareness of precancerous lesions, we will be able to strangle precancerous lesions by the throat and ultimately eliminate them!

This article is based on a speech by Tian Yantao (Director of Pancreatic and Gastric Surgery, Cancer Hospital, Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences) at the Starry Sky Forum.