Lung Cancer: what are its symptoms and how to prevent lung cancer?

In the presence of hemoptysis (bloody spug) or chronic persistent pulmonary or general symptoms, a checkup is required to investigate a possible bronchopulmonary cancer. The diagnosis is confirmed by the analysis of tumor fragments taken by biopsy during bronchile fibroscopy.

What are the symptoms of lung cancer ?

Before the onset of symptoms, bronchopulmonary cancer can be discovered on a balance sheet for another reason.

Respiratory symptoms
Respiratory symptoms that may reveal lung cancer are multiple. In the beginning, these are often signs that may seem quite banal in a smoker or former smoker.

Due to the persistence of an abnormal symptom, it is important to consult your attending physician, especially in the case of smoking in progress and even stopped for a long time, but also in any non-smoker.

It can be:

• a cough that appears and persists without apparent cause;
• chronic bronchopneumopathy cough;
• shortness of breath of recent onset or worsening of respiratory difficulties;
• chest or shoulder pain
• blood-containing sputum (hemoptysies);
• repeated pulmonary infections: bronchitis, pneumonia;
• a change in the voice (timbre or intensity) that often becomes wrapped or veted;
• wheezing during breathing;

Non-respiratory symptoms
Medical advice is required in the presence of the following symptoms:

• abnormal fatigue (asthenia);
• difficulty swallowing (dysphagia);
• a recent loss of appetite
• involuntary weight loss;
• oedema of the neck and eyelids in the morning upon awakening due to compression of the upper vena cava by lymph nodes present in the thorax;
• any long-lasting anomaly that does not spontaneously regress. In fact, symptoms accompanying lung cancer but not related to the
• lungs may appear. They are grouped under the name “partheoplastic syndromes”.
• In the absence of early diagnosis of lung cancer, metastases in the brain, bone and liver can develop and be responsible for symptoms:
• headache, bone pain and jaundice (yellow-bell).

Preventing the onset of lung cancer

Tobacco is the source of the vast majority of bronchopulmonary cancers (or lung cancers). It is therefore possible to reduce the risk of cancer by eliminating active and passive smoking. Occupational exposures, as well as some environmental factors are much more rarely involved.

Smoking, even if not important, significantly increases the risk of lung cancer. It is necessary to avoid all forms of tobacco (cigarettes, cigars, cigarillos, Hookah…) as well as cannabis, also carcinogenic.

Passive smoking also increases the risk of lung cancer. It is important to avoid smoky atmospheres and not expose children to tobacco smoke.

It is important to do everything to stop smoking definitively. Smoking cessation provides a better quality of life, decreases the risk of obstructive pulmonary disease, cardiovascular risk, and reduces the risk of cancer (lung cancer, bladder cancer, upper aerodigestive tract cancer …)