Cerebral cancer is a disease that can develop in a person at any age. The distinction of oncogenesis of this localization is that it does not give metastasis beyond the cranium and does not metastasize through the lymphatic vessels. Modern technologies allow to completely cure this disease, but the condition for successful treatment is early diagnosis. How to recognize the cancer of the brain, what first signs and symptoms should be alerted and cause an appeal to a doctor and examination, let's talk further.
Early symptoms of brain cancer
The most common symptom of the tumor in the brain at the initial stage is a headache. At the given pathology painful sensations have chronic character, differ intensity, are not stopped by preparations-analgesics. Most often, the pain is characterized as oppressive, bursting or pulsating. A significant increase in pain is noted with physical exertion, coughing, sneezing, tilting, abdominal tension, and also in stressful situations.
As a rule, the pain appears or intensifies in the second half of the night, in the morning. This can be explained as follows. The tumor, increasing in size, secretes into the surrounding tissues toxic substances that interfere with normal blood flow. During sleep, when a person is in a horizontal position, blood stasis occurs, and when the vertical position is taken, the outflow of blood is somewhat normalized, and the pain becomes less.
In many cases, headaches are accompanied by vomiting, not dependent on food intake, sometimes appearing after a change in the position of the head. Vomiting is associated with the effect of the tumor on the vomiting center. Patients also often complain of weakness, drowsiness , a constant sense of fatigue.
Other symptoms of brain cancer
As the disease progresses, the following symptoms appear:
- Vertigo - arise regardless of the position of the body and is due to increased intracranial pressure or tumor pressure on the vestibular apparatus.
- Mental-mental disorders - memory disorders, concentration of attention, mental abilities, the ability to express their thoughts. Patients may seem to be detached from what is happening around, lose the ability to navigate in time and space, they are often overcome by attacks of unmotivated aggression, apathy. In some cases visual and auditory hallucinations are noted.
- Dysfunction of the sensory organs. With the pressure of the neoplasm on the brain areas responsible for the senses, hearing, vision, speech, etc. can be observed. Visual disturbances are most often manifested by the appearance of fog and tingling before the eyes, usually in the mornings, as well as by reduced visual acuity.
- Violations of motor functions - in addition to disrupting coordination of movements , patients may lose the ability to move (usually it manifests on one side of the body),
up to complete paralysis.
Also, some patients have epileptic seizures. The rate of development and severity of symptoms depend on the localization of malignant formation and on the characteristics of its growth. Sometimes patients and their relatives, marking similar symptoms of brain cancer, connect them with the damage to the brain vessels during a stroke or take them for manifestations of migraine. Only the doctor can make an accurate diagnosis after special examinations (neurological examinations, magnetic resonance imaging or computed tomography, stereotactic biopsy, etc.).