Dry Skin as a Side Effect of Cancer Treatment
Dry skin is one of the more common side effects of most forms of cancer treatment, including both radiation therapy and chemotherapy. While there are many other causes of dry skin, it is one of the more common issues cancer patients must learn to cope with as a routine part of their treatment.
Dry skin occurs when there is a lack of moisture in the skin cells, this can cause your skin to appear rough, scaly, and flaky. Your skin may also feel tight and constantly itchy. While dry skin is a fairly common condition among those who are not undergoing treatment for cancer, it is more common among those who are undergoing chemo or radiation therapy.
Constant Cell Replacement
Under normal conditions,
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Mario Lacouture of the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, "There are many things you can do to prevent dry skin. People tend to think of dry skin as just a cosmetic problem but dry skin can get so severely dry that it becomes inflamed and more susceptible to infections." If you notice any changes whatsoever, it is important for you to let your doctor or cancer care team know about them. They are a very important source for information about what is happening to your skin and how you should care for it during and after your treatment.
There are also several very important steps you can take to help reduce the damaging effects of both chemotherapy and radiation therapy to your skin.
Treat Your Skin Gently
During and immediately after treatment you need to be very gentle in the way you treat your skin. Try not to rub, scratch, or scrub your skin. When you get out of the shower be sure to pat your skin dry with the towel instead of rubbing it. Wear clothes that are soft next to your skin to reduce irritation. Unless your doctor tells you to do so, avoid using ice packs on any treated areas of skin as they will only cause it to dry out more
These recurrent nodules and abscesses not only cause pain, but self-consciousness, social isolation and even depression. Other less common complications include severe infections, restricted movement caused by a buildup of fibrosis and a type of skin cancer called squamous cell carcinoma.
For my summer assignment, I read the book Skinwalkers by Tony Hillerman. Skinwalkers is about a Navajo police officer named Jim Chee. The story takes place on the Navajo Reservation spanning several states (Arizona, Utah, Colorado, and New Mexico). Throughout the book, Chee works with Lieutenant Joe Leaphorn to solve three seemingly connected homicides. Over the course of the story, the Officers find several strange bits of evidence, such as small bones and strange stories about things happening around the reservation. As the case progresses, Chee and Leaphorn discover that the motive may be much deeper than just hate, it may have to do with witchcraft. As the story concludes, Leaphorn realizes that Chee has been led into a trap and rushes
Ichtyosis Vulgaris is incurable that only thing you can do is just treat it correctly. There are some researchers and physicians have and continued to develop new ways to manage this order the right way. With heavy-duty moisturizers, creams, and ointments can also assist you it’s better than using lotions. You will be living with Ichtyosis Vulgaris so just accept it as it is.
To avoid skin discoloration, you may follow the same recommendations for avoiding venous insufficiency. These
There are essentially three main types of cancer treatments; surgery, chemotherapy, and radiation. Surgery allows doctors to effectively remove tumors from a clear plane. Chemotherapy uses drugs to treat the tumor; but often the drugs affect other healthy cells in the process. Using radiation as a treatment can be either precise or vague. Many health stigmas can come from the vague forms of radiation or conventional radiation therapy. Conventional radiation treats both the unhealthy and healthy cells, therefore exposing healthy cells to harmful radiation (Radiation Oncology, 2011, p.6). When healthy cells are exposed to gamma radiation they are also exposed to ionizing radiation. The ionization can cause “breakage of chemical bonds or oxidization (addition of oxygen atoms)” in a cell; the main impact of this is on a cell’s DNA, if two strands of DNA break it can result in “mutations, chromosome aberrations, ...
Various treatments may be used for months or years because eczema can be very persistent. There are creams and ointments that help calm the itching and irritation to help repair the skin, which could also be prescribed by your doctor. Drugs prescribed by your doctor could also be for infections caused by open sores or cracks. There are also oral drugs prescribed to help calm the inflammation for severe cases. Wet dressings may also be necessary when the eczema is severe. This involves wrapping the affected area with topical corticosteroids and wet bandages, usually done in a hospital. If the treatment is successful, it could still be possible that it may return. Light therapy would be needed to stop it from coming back. This involves exposing the skin to controlled amounts of natural sunlight, but it has harmful effects that could cause premature skin aging and an increased risk of skin cancer. Therapies like these are important to be spoken about with your doctor if it is what's best, especially if it's for younger children since it is riskier.
The importance of skin-to-skin care for the childbearing family is that every newborn can benefit. Skin-to-skin is valuable because it promotes thermoregulation, cardio-respiratory stability, breast milk supply, and mother-infant bonding (Hugill, 2015; Baker-Rush, 2016; Gregson, 2011; Pigeon Turenne, Héon, Aita, Faessler, & Doddridge, 2016). The nurse’s role in skin-to-skin is to educate women and their families of its benefits. The nurse will be able to implement the carative factors of a teaching-learning experience with the parents, develop a helping-trusting relationship, as well as tend to basic human needs of the patients (Watson, 2008).
Radiation therapy is a complex treatment plan to treat cancer in patients. Its treatment can be used alone or in conjunction with surgery or chemotherapy. Radiation therapy is delivered by a team of individuals who specialize in the treatment of cancer. There are several ways in which the radiation can be delivered to the patient with specialized equipment. Radiation therapy is an exciting field of study that can be beneficial to patients who are affected by cancer.
...effects that can come with chemotherapy such as nausea, vomiting, hair loss, fatigue, mouth sores, and more. Radiation therapy is pretty bad but not as painful with side effects. Side effects for radiation therapy are coughing, fever, fullness of chest, soreness and scaring. Many times surgery is not an option but when is it is one of the best options due to the fact there are less side effects and no strenuous treatment. One of the reasons cancer is such a bad thing is because the treatment is not good but research is taking place and working to get more effective.
I have chosen to do my essay on the largest organ of the body, skin. It has several functions vital to the survival of the body as I will discuss in the following paragraphs.
Most parents remembered hearing about the importance of protecting their children from the sun, yet children are still playing in the sun without sunscreen or protective clothing. Many people these days are not taking skin cancer seriously after knowing its significance. Skin cancer has been a growing problem in the United States and millions of people have suffered from it every year. The three most common skin cancers are Melanoma, Basal cell, and Squamous cell, which can cause bumps, sores, growths, etc. Skin cancer is a deadly disease with many causes, but the advantage is that it can be prevented.
...cations. Many people will find that amount of sunlight they receive has little or no impact on the state of their psoriasis, but in the cases where the light therapy has worked, it seems to reduce the appearance of the lesions greatly. Obviously, the risk of the UV light therapy is the possible threat of skin cancer.
While chemotherapy is beneficial at curing or helping a disease such as cancer, it can has a negative effect on a person’s body too.
One way of preventing dry skin is to spend less time in the bath or shower. Bathe or shower once a day and make sure you are in and out within fifteen minutes. This means your body's natural oils are not stripped. Use gentle cleansers on your skin, preferably ones which contain added moisturizers.
We need the sun for everything; food, transportation, education, and just to live. The sun negatively affects us in our daily lives because our skin is sensitive to the sun. This means that we are prone to burn. A way to protect our skin is with sunscreen. The short-term effect of not wearing sunscreen when exposed to the sun is you can get a painful rash or peeling of skin can occur. Long-term effects of not protecting yourself from the sun can be that it changes your DNA or gives you skin cancer. It changes your DNA by radiation smashing into you skin. The reason why this is so dangerous is because the DNA will now instruct the skin to fix itself because of the radiation, but the instructions would have been changed. It can also speed up