Chapter 12: General Concepts of Chemotherapy and Radiotherapy

Chemotherapy can be used in most of the cancers that affect women's gynaecological organs, although the commonest time when chemotherapy is used is for women who have ovarian cancer. There are lots of misconceptions that people have about chemotherapy. First, and most important, is that one often hears people say ‘it doesn't work’. This simply is just not true. The difficulty with chemotherapy is in some ways having a picture in your mind's eye of what a cancer looks like and then imagining a drug being poured in, usually via a drip into a vein, and then thinking how that can get rid of cancer. The authors can quite honestly personally testify to having looked inside lots of people's tummies before chemotherapy and after chemotherapy and the difference is truly staggering. Lots and lots of tumour just literally disappears into thin air after chemotherapy…