Nagpur: Almost 80% of lung cancer patients come for treatment very late, according to doctors who were speaking at a medical seminar on Sunday.The seminar on lung cancer was organized by HCG NCHRI Cancer Centre and Vidarbha Chest Association. Dr Ajay Mehta, director and head of surgical oncology at HCG NCHRI said, “There is now increased awareness about the disease, but people still come late because it can be confused with symptoms of other medical problems.”Since the symptoms are similar to that of tuberculosis, many patients from rural areas get treated wrongly.Dr Vaibhav Chaudhary, consultant-medical oncology at HCG NCHRI said, “For the first four to five months they are treated for TB only.” Since lung cancer does not manifest itself like other diseases, people do not take it up on priority.Dr Mehta said, “Lung cancer is an internal disease which one cannot see, unlike a lump in case of mouth cancer. It is only when a patient starts coughing blood does he realize that something is wrong.”Pollution, along with smoking tobacco, is one of the leading causes of lung cancer. Dr Chaudhary said, “Pollution which contains carcinogenic elements is what causes cancer. Same with cigarettes, it is what is present in tobacco that causes lung cancer. So pollution like dust won’t cause cancer, unless some carcinogenic particle is present.”Dr Parag Ingle, a consulting onco-surgeon said some tests can be held for early detection of the dreaded disease. “A low dose CT scan can help in early detection. The benefit is that it used less than half the radiation used in a normal CT scan,” he said .Common symptoms of lung cancer are coughing of blood, chest pain, loss of appetite, weight loss, general fatigue, shortness of breath and chain in voice.

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