Advances in Understanding Cancer
Overview
By the second half of the twentieth century, heart disease, cancer, and stroke had replaced infectious, epidemic diseases as the leading causes of death in the United States. After centuries of confusion about the basic causes of cancer, scientists are gaining insights into the factors that cause the loss of control of cell multiplication that is the fundamental characteristic of cancer. A cure for cancer remains elusive, but many promising experimental approaches to diagnosis and treatment, based on developments in immunology and molecular biology, were undergoing clinical trials by the end of the 1990s.
Background
Cancer is basically defined as a process that leads to the loss of control of normal cell division and multiplication. Cancer cells can form tumors that invade neighboring tissues and metastasize to establish tumors at distant sites in the body. The term "cancer" actually refers to several different forms of the disorder, which are defined in terms of the tissue of origin. A cancer that originates in connective tissues, bone, or muscle is called a "sarcoma." The most common form of cancer originates in epithelial tissues and organs, such as the breast, lungs, or stomach, and is known as a "carcinoma." The World Health Organization has classified cancers into about 100 different kinds, depending on their sites of origin, but cancer specialists believe that there are actually many more forms of cancer.
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