ALL and a tumor?

[Nay]

Hello,

First off, I do not have cancer. This is about my friend, who was diagnosed with ALL a few weeks back. He has undergone his first chemotherapy this week. According to the doctors, the ALL has developed in the past 2 months.

The thing is, he has a tumor in his chest, near his lungs and heart. I have, due to circumstances, been unable to visit him as of yet and I also did not want to distress him by asking too many questions over the phone, but the doctors have never been really clear on this. I never knew ALL could also cause tumors in the body - unless the cancer has already spread.

Does this mean the cancer has spread already, or does ALL come with tumors in the body?


All replies highly appreciated.. Thank you so much, and good luck to all of you.

[brainman]

Hi Nay, I am sorry that your friend has ALL. My father died of ALL complications in Sept 2006. I have never heard of ALL in solid (tumor) form but there is more that I have not heard about than what I have heard about so I am not the final answer to your basic question. Do you know if your friend's medical team has done a biopsy on this tumor? One of the first things that I thought about when I read your post was an enlarged lymph node commonly caused by an infection. Since ALL and the treatment to try to control it decreases your friends immunity, it is quite possible that he has or had an infection. But that is just one of many possibilities. I would consult with his medical team and request a biopsy to verify what this "tumor" is.

[Nay]

Thank you for your reply. I'm very sorry to hear about your father.

The tumor was there in the first place, this is how they discovered he has cancer. He was suffering from severe pain in his chest, caused by this tumor (it was 10 cm), and at first, the doctors thought he had.. I'm not a native English speaker, so I'm unsure how it's called, but in my language it would be lymph gland(?) cancer. From what I know, the biopsy returned that it was agressive and malicious and cancer for sure. That's all I know.

They started out by giving him medicines that would diminish the size of the tumor, because he was also having difficulties breathing and a tumor near the heart could cause problems (he has quite the high blood pressure in that area because of it). However, after a week they discovered it was actually leukemia, but they never elaborated on how the tumor came to be...

[Nay]

Hello again,

I called an organization specialised in the fight against cancer, to ask this very same question. They replied that leukemia can indeed 'spread' to the lymph, and this causes a tumor. This also means the leukemia is more developed, than a leukemia that has not developed tumors elsewhere.

However, I would be very happy if someone could share his knowledge on this topic with me, and/or possible experiences.


This is as I feared - it also makes the prognosis worse. The chances that the chemo will work, are, according to circumstances, but in his case most likely only 60%. I have not dared to ask what his survival chances are, and I don't need to know, as well.

Thank you.

[brainman]

Nay, thank you for sharing this information with us. I am still learning so much every day about cancers! I think the word you are looking for is "lymph nodes" the usually same glandular structures that filter out infected and dying cells, especially white blood cells. Lymph nodes are not true glands because they do not secrete anything.

Is your friend going to have surgery to remove the tumor or just chemotherapy to try to kill the cancer where ever it is?

Keep us informed.