Why does my cancer need to be “staged?” How is it done?
Staging is the process by which your doctors get an idea of how big your cancer is and how far it may have spread. Staging is critical to treatment. Patients with small tumors that have not spread far can have potentially curative surgery. Patients whose mesothelioma has spread all over the area and into the lymph glands, whether inside the chest or abdomen, or whose tumor has metastasized, have many less options.
Once you have the diagnosis of mesothelioma, staging will be going on as your other tests proceed. Some information can be learned from scans, such as CT scans, MRI scans, or even PET scans. Pet scans show areas where sugar is actively being metabolized (used), and spots of mesothelioma can “light up.”
If your biopsy was done by thorascoscopy or laparascopy, the doctor may have been able to see if the mesothelioma has grown into the adjacent tissue. He may have seen if pleural mesothelioma has grown into the chest wall, or diaphragm (the muscle at the bottom of your lungs), how much the tumor has spread over and into the lung. He may have been able to see if there appeared to be involved lymph nodes, and where they are, depending on where the exactly the thorascoscope was placed.
During a laparoscopy, the doctor may have been able to see if the tumor has spread all over the abdomen.
Sometimes complete, accurate staging cannot be done without a surgical procedure.
Most of the standard, staging protocols are for pleural mesothelioma.
Also See: Staging