Ovarian cancer is known as one of the most lethal of women’s cancers; and women diagnosed with it go through a lot with the difficult treatment and the discomfort that go along with it. It is most unfortunate that some women experience pain with ovarian cancer whether because of the cancer itself or to related treatments.
Complaints of pain range from pelvic pain to pain during sexual intercourse. A common example is the abdominal pain that is not associated with diarrhea or vomiting and occurs in 22% of cases of women before they went to the doctor only to get diagnosed for ovarian cancer.
Should you be a patient, the occurrence of ovarian cancer pain, as well as the amount of pain you feel, will often depend on three things; these are: the type of ovarian cancer you have, the stage or extent of the disease and your pain threshold. Your tolerance for pain determines how much of it you will feel.
Ovarian cancer pain can be caused by several things which can include a tumor, ovarian cancer treatment, and things not related to the disease. A tumor can cause pain for the patient when it is located in the body where it continually presses itself against nerves, bones, or the other organs near the patient’s ovaries.
Treatment of ovarian cancer, such as chemotherapy, can also cause pain due to the side effects of the drugs used in the treatment. A patient undergoing chemotherapy experiences various discomforts and symptoms which linger after the chemotherapy is done. As for pain caused by things not related to the cancer, these are manifested through the patient’s experience of headaches or muscle pain.
You will be glad to know that the patient is given several options for reducing ovarian cancer pain. Prescriptions and advice, from a patient’s doctor or a specialist in pain control, can greatly help lessen the pain experienced from cancer of the ovaries.
To relieve or reduce the pain, you can resort to pain medicine, alternative treatments, radiation, or a nerve block. For the majority of women afflicted with the disease, medicine and alternative treatments are successful in minimizing the pain.
With regards to pain medicine, you can consult with your doctor, nurse, or pharmacist prior to taking any medicine for ovarian cancer pain. You can actually purchase effective pain relievers even without a doctor’s prescription. Such medicines are called nonprescriped pain killers or simply over-the-counter pain relievers. For supplementary medications, you are required to get a prescription from your doctor.
Problems in taking pain relievers include making people drowsy and constipated. However, these can be remedied through resting and taking laxatives periodically. Rarely do women become addicted to pain medicine which is good news.
As for alternative treatments that may be used to deal with ovarian cancer pain, these can include massage, acupuncture, and acupressure. Relaxation techniques, like breathing slowly and listening to soothing music, may also be learned by patients to ease the pain from their bodies.
Radiation, or high-energy rays, can help reduce the pain by shrinking the tumor that ovarian cancer has caused. As for nerve blocking, a doctor may inject alcohol into the vicinity around specific nerves near the ovaries to block the cancer pain.
Communication is crucial for treating ovarian cancer pain. The doctor or nurse will fail to know how much pain is experienced by the patient unless she tells them. Let your medical team help you determine the cause of your pain and the best way to treat it.
