What Is Surgery for Cancer?

The simple versionExplain▾

Surgery, when used to treat cancer, is a procedure in which a surgeon removes cancer from your body. Surgeons are medical doctors with special training in surgery.

Surgery works best for solid tumors that are contained in one area. It is a local treatment, meaning that it treats only the part of your body with the cancer. It is not used for leukemia (a type of blood cancer) or for cancers that have spread.

Surgery removes cancer from your body and works best for solid tumors in one area.

How surgery is performedExplain▾

Surgeons often use small, thin knives, called scalpels, and other sharp tools to cut the body. Surgery often requires cuts through skin, muscles, and sometimes bone. After surgery, these cuts can be painful and take some time to heal.

Anesthesia keeps you from feeling pain during surgery. Anesthesia refers to drugs or other substances that cause you to lose feeling or awareness. There are three types:

• Local anesthesia causes loss of feeling in one small area of the body.
• Regional anesthesia causes loss of feeling in a part of the body, such as an arm or leg.
• General anesthesia causes loss of feeling and a complete loss of awareness that seems like a very deep sleep.

Some treatments do not use scalpels. These include cryosurgery (using extreme cold to destroy abnormal tissue), lasers (powerful beams of light that cut through tissue), hyperthermia (exposing tissue to high temperatures), and photodynamic therapy (using drugs that react to light).

Types of surgeryExplain▾

There are many types of surgery, differing by the purpose, the part of the body, the amount of tissue to be removed, and sometimes what the patient prefers. Surgery may be open or minimally invasive:

• In open surgery, the surgeon makes one large cut to remove the tumor, some healthy tissue, and maybe some nearby lymph nodes.
• In minimally invasive surgery, the surgeon makes a few small cuts instead of one large one. They insert a long, thin tube with a tiny camera, called a laparoscope, into one of the cuts. The camera shows the inside of the body on a monitor, and special tools inserted through the other cuts remove the tumor and some healthy tissue.

Because minimally invasive surgery requires smaller cuts, it takes less time to recover from than open surgery.

Smaller cuts usually mean a shorter recovery.

How surgery works against cancerExplain▾

Depending on your type of cancer and how advanced it is, surgery can be used to:

• Remove the entire tumor when the cancer is contained in one area.
• Debulk a tumor by removing some, but not all, of it. This is used when removing the entire tumor might damage an organ or the body. Removing part of a tumor can help other treatments work better.
• Ease cancer symptoms by removing tumors that are causing pain or pressure.

Sometimes surgery is the only treatment you need, but most often you will also have other cancer treatments.

Risks of surgeryExplain▾

Surgeons are highly trained and will do everything they can to prevent problems, but sometimes problems do occur. Common problems are:

• Pain. After surgery, most people have pain in the part of the body that was operated on. Your doctor or nurse can help you manage it — talk with them before surgery about pain control, and afterward tell them if your pain is not controlled.
• Infection. To help prevent infection, follow your nurse's instructions about caring for the area where you had surgery. If you develop an infection, your doctor can prescribe a medicine (an antibiotic) to treat it.

Other risks include bleeding, damage to nearby tissues, and reactions to the anesthesia. Talk to your doctor about the possible risks for your type of surgery.

What to expectExplain▾

Before surgery, a nurse may call to tell you how to prepare and about tests you need, such as blood tests, a chest x-ray, or an electrocardiogram (ECG). You may not be able to eat or drink for a certain period before surgery — it is important to follow these instructions, or your surgery may need to be rescheduled.

During surgery, once you are under anesthesia, the surgeon removes the cancer, usually along with some healthy tissue around it. This helps improve the chances that all the cancer has been removed. The surgeon might also remove lymph nodes or other nearby tissues to check under a microscope whether the cancer has spread.

After surgery, the nurse will tell you how to control pain, which activities to do and avoid, how to care for your wound, how to spot signs of infection, and when you can return to work. You will have at least one more visit with the surgeon a week or two after you go home.

Eating and working after surgeryExplain▾

Surgery increases your need for good nutrition. If you are weak or underweight, you may need a high-protein, high-calorie diet before surgery. Some surgeries change how your body uses food, especially surgery of the mouth, stomach, intestines, or throat. If you have trouble eating, you may be given nutrients through a feeding tube or IV, and a dietitian can help.

You will need to take time off work to have and recover from surgery — from one day to many weeks. How long depends on the type of anesthesia, the type and extent of the surgery, and the kind of work you do. If you expect a longer recovery, talk with your employer about medical leave.