About 2,000 new cases of Mesothelioma are diagnosed in the United States each year. This numbers of cases are growing at exponential sizes because of the big Asbestos exposure that the citizens have in our days. Mesothelioma is a form of cancer that is almost always caused by previous exposure to asbestos. With the cases growing exponential the requirements of trustful information are huge.
This rare form of cancer (malignancy) that most frequently arises from the cells lining the sacs of the chest (the pleura) or the abdomen (the peritoneum). Mesothelioma that affects the pleura can cause these signs and symptoms:chest wall painpleural effusion, or fluid surrounding the lung shortness of breath fatigue or anemia wheezing, hoarseness, or cough blood in the sputum (fluid) coughed up. The disease is described as localized if the cancer is found only on the membrane surface where it originated.
The development of the cancer in rats has been demonstrated following intra-pleural inoculation of phosphorylated chrysotile fibres. The disease occurs more often in men than in women and risk increases with age, but this disease can appear in either men or women at any age is not contagious and cannot be passed from one person to another. Symptoms include weight loss and cachexia, abdominal swelling and pain due to ascites (a buildup of fluid in the abdominal cavity). Other symptoms of peritoneal mesothelioma may include bowel obstruction, blood clotting abnormalities, anemia, and fever.
Most people with malignant mesothelioma have worked on jobs where they breathed asbestos. Others have been exposed to asbestos in a household environment, often without knowing it. An exposure of as little as one or two months can result in mesothelioma 30 or 40 years later. People exposed in the 1940s, 50s, 60s, and 70s are now being diagnosed with the disease because of the long latency period of asbestos disease. Since epidemiologic studies have shown that more that 80% of mesotheliomas may be associated with asbestos exposure, documented cases in a worker with occupational exposure to asbestos may be compensable in many parts of America.
In contrast to lung cancers, these tumors don not appear to be associated with smoking. Relatively short-term asbestos exposures of 1to 2 years or less occurring some 20 to 25 years in the past have been associated with the development of mesotheliomas (an observation that emphasizes the importance of obtaining a complete environmental exposure history). Some Statistics say's that the risk for this type of tumor peaks 30 to 35 years after initial exposure. Since maximum exposure took place in the United States between 1930 and 1960, peak incidence of disease in men occurred in 1997, with a total of 2300 cases. Incidence is expected to decline over the next 30 years to about 500 cases per year. However with the terrorist attacks of 2001 in New York and Washington, hundreds of people were exposed to asbestos, when the buildings collapsed and the asbestos dust was were expanded in the environment. With this in mind the real cases can increase in the next years.
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