Peritoneal Mesothelioma: Diagnosis
Approximately 10 to 20 percent of newly diagnosed malignant mesothelioma cases are peritoneal, or located in the abdominal lining. Other types of malignant mesothelioma are pleural mesothelioma, pericardial mesothelioma and testicular mesothelioma. As in thes types of malignant mesothelioma, exposure to asbestos is the only known cause of peritoneal mesothelioma. Asbestos fibers are either swallowed or migrate from the lungs to the stomach.
Peritoneal mesothelioma tumors can be benign or malignant. Malignant peritoneal mesothelioma is a life-threatening disease. In the past, patients diagnosed with peritoneal mesothelioma had an average survival rate of less than two years, but modern surgical and chemotherapy advancements have improved the odds of survival.
Peritoneal mesothelioma symptoms often resemble common ailments, and some patients exhibit no symptoms. Early diagnosis is unlikely, and once symptoms appear, the cancer may have progressed so far that treatment options are severely limited. Doctors looking for other abdominal problems sometimes find peritoneal mesothelioma in the early stages, but this finding is extremely rare. No reliable method of early detection exists. There is no blood test yet that will reveal the presence of any kind of malignant mesothelioma, and early stage tumors are so small that they can rarely be seen on an X-ray or CT scan that may be ordered for some other purpose.
People with peritoneal mesothelioma rarely suspect that something is wrong until the symptoms appear. When they visit a doctor to investigate symptoms, peritoneal mesothelioma is not likely to be the first possibility the doctor considers.
Testing for Peritoneal Mesothelioma
When a patient experiences the pain and breathing difficulty associated with late-stage peritoneal mesothelioma symptoms and visits a doctor for diagnosis, the doctor will consider the complaints and look for a cause using routine testing methods. If the patient’s abdominal cavity is filled with fluid, the doctor will be able to tell by the look and feel of the abdominal area. He may order an X-ray, CT scan, ultrasound, or MRI to have a look inside the abdomen without surgery. The next step for the patient may be a trip to the hospital or a specialist for additional testing.
The only way to determine a reliable peritoneal mesothelioma diagnosis is to take a biopsy. Making a small incision to allow a camera for a view inside the patient’s abdomen allows the physician to locate cancerous areas and take a sample. This sample is tested to determine what type of cancer the patient has and whether the tumors are malignant.
New research into diagnostic testing is ongoing. Encouraging clinical tests have found that chemical markers in the blood of diagnosed malignant mesothelioma patients may prove to be a reliable method of detection via a simple blood test in the future. However, to-date, the research has only been done on patients who were already diagnosed and are in the late stages of the disease. Research has not yet been done to locate early stage malignant mesothelioma due to the difficulty of finding early stage patients.
The Results
Waiting for a diagnosis is an unsettling experience. Test results often take weeks due to the volume of tests performed by labs. The wait is normal and should be expected. The doctor has no power to speed the process, which tends to increase anxiety for the patient and his family.
Once the peritoneal mesothelioma diagnosis is made, a medical team is assembled to care for the patient. The team addresses the various needs of the patient, including pain management, home care, education, testing, surgeries, doctor visits, and counseling.
