Many people speculate that cancer treatment can cause or increase the chances of developing future
cancers, particularly radiation therapy for treating prostate cancer.
Although it isn’t possible to predict who might get future cancer, people who have cancer are the people who are most at risk of developing second cancer. And with that said, cancer treatment, such as radiation therapy might aid in causing it to develop.
The risks of developing future cancer after radiation therapy
Many years ago, radiation therapy was recognized as one of the possible reasons for getting cancer a second time. Note that most of the information about radiation comes all the way back from the atomic bomb
survivors in Japan and employees who got cancer because of too much exposure to radiation.
How does radiation therapy cause future cancer?
Patients will be exposed to high-energy radiation to shrink the tumors and kill cancer cells throughout the course of the entire treatment. Although it is effective against cancer cells, there is a high chance of it
affecting other cells as well.
According to a study by the National Cancer Institute, there is a rare chance that people who get treated with radiation therapy can get second cancer later in life, which is unrelated to their primary cancer.
Radiation therapy might cause cancer but people should also hold on to the fact that it is rare to get second cancer just because of radiation therapy alone.
In another study, they confirmed that they knew for a long time that radiation can cause cancer. However, the chances of getting future cancer for treating prostate cancer are a lot less likely than
radiation for other cancers like breast cancer. In that same study, they also state that developing cancer due to radiation concerns other factors like age. As the patient ages, the chances of developing future cancer get slightly higher.
