Oncological Medicine: Beyond the Basics

Oncology is a branch of medicine that is concerned with the diagnosis, treatment and prevention of cancer. An important domain within oncology is medical oncology, which is a modality of cancer treatment that involves hormonal therapy, targeted therapy, chemotherapy and immunotherapy. Chemotherapy uses drugs to kill cancer cells by stopping or slowing down their growth. It can however harm healthy cells of the body thereby resulting in many side-effects. It can be of two types- neoadjuvant and adjuvant chemotherapies. Immunotherapy is a unique technique in cancer care that activates the immune cells of the body to fight against cancer cells. This is done using vaccines, drug therapy and dendritic cell therapy. Targeted therapy targets specific genes and proteins associated with cancer growth, while hormone therapy slows down the growth of the cancer by reducing or blocking the hormones essential to its growth. This book explores all the important aspects of oncological medicine in the present day scenario. Different approaches, evaluations, methodologies and advanced studies on oncological medicine have been included herein. The extensive content of this book provides the readers with a thorough understanding of the recent advances in this domain.