Gastrointestinal Cancer

Colon and Rectal Cancer

Signs and Symptoms
Diagnosis
Treatment

Treatment

Surgery
Surgery is the most common treatment of all stages of colon cancer. A doctor may take out the cancer from the colon using a variety of methods, depending on the stage and size of a patient's tumor.

Radiation therapy
Radiation therapy is the use of X-rays or other high-energy rays to kill cancer cells and shrink tumors. Radiation may come from a machine outside the body or external radiation therapy, or from putting materials that contain radiation through thin plastic tubes, called internal radiation therapy, in the intestine area. Radiation can be used alone or in addition to surgery and chemotherapy.

Chemotherapy
Chemotherapy is the use of drugs to kill cancer cells. Chemotherapy may be taken by pill, or it may be put into the body by inserting a needle into a vein. A patient may be given chemotherapy through a tube that will be left in the vein while a small pump gives the patient constant treatment over a period of weeks. Chemotherapy is called a systemic treatment because the drug enters the bloodstream, travels through the body, and can kill cancer cells outside the colon. If the cancer has spread, the patient may be given chemotherapy directly into the artery going to the newly infected part of the body. If the doctor removes all the cancer that can be seen at the time of the operation, the patient may be given chemotherapy after surgery to kill any cancer cells that are left. Chemotherapy given after an operation to a person who has no cancer cells that can be seen is called adjuvant chemotherapy.

Biological treatment
Biological treatment tries to get the body to fight cancer. It uses materials made by the body or made in a laboratory to boost, direct, or restore the body's natural defenses against disease. Biological treatment is sometimes called immunotherapy.

Last reviewed in April 2002 by health care specialists at UCSF Medical Center.