Early detection helps reduce ovarian cancer risk: Expert

Early detection helps reduce ovarian cancer risk: Expert

Debbie A. Lubis, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

Career women who do not get married until their early 30s, or
women who get married but do not get pregnant, are running a high
risk of suffering from ovarian cancer, a health expert says.

Nasdaldy, an obstetrician and gynecologist at the Dharmais
Cancer Hospital, said on Tuesday that women who had their first
period at a very young age or those who experienced late
menopause were also at high risk of ovarian cancer.

Speaking on the sidelines of a seminar titled "How to Prevent
Ovarian Cancer", Nasdaldy said regular pelvic examinations could
reveal the presence of tender nodules with lumpy cells which are
often found in the posterior vaginal wall or ovary regions.

"A woman has a 50 percent chance of getting ovarian cancer if
at least one of her immediate family members has had breast
and/or ovarian cancer," said Nasdaldy, calling on career women to
have regular pelvic examinations to reduce the risk of ovarian
cancer.

A woman from a family that had no history of cancer still has
a 1.5 percent chance (one out of 70 women), of developing ovarian
cancer at some point in her life.

Ovarian cancer is the second most common cause of death among
gynecological cancers after cervical cancer.

According to Nasdaldy, taking oral contraceptive pills could
help reduce the risk of ovarian cancer by up to 50 percent.

The Dharmais Hospital receives some 50 new cases of ovarian
cancer every year, most of them involving women over 40.

Indonesian female teenagers and women aged between 25 and 35
had also been found to have early signs of ovarium cancer in the
form of cysts in their ovaria.

"Because no effective screening test for ovarian cancer
exists, over 80 percent of women with ovarian cancer are
diagnosed in the advanced stages of the disease," Nasdaldy said.

"Ovarian cancer cells frequently implant in the uterus,
bladder, bowel and omentum. These begin forming new tumor growths
before cancer is even suspected." he said.

Nasdaldy said that those in the advanced stages of ovarian
cancer often showed symptoms like a sense of pelvic heaviness,
vague lower abdominal discomfort, vaginal bleeding, weight gain
or loss, abnormal menstrual cycles and increased abdominal girth.

Additional symptoms that were often associated with the
disease were an increase in urinary frequency or urgency, and
lack of appetite.