Lung cancer is the leading cause of cancer death in the US. With routine screenings, you can decrease the chance of you or a loved one being diagnosed with advanced lung cancer. This can save you money, stress, and time. Read on to learn how.

Lung Cancer Awareness Month

November is lung cancer awareness month. Lung cancer is mostly caused by smoking but not always. 10-20% of lung cancers occur in people who have never smoked or have smoked very little in their lifetime. Other risk factors for lung cancer include a family history of lung cancer, exposure to air pollution, asbestos, second-hand smoke, or other carcinogens. Talk to your doctor about getting screened. Catching lung cancer early is key to cost-effective, curative treatment. 

Lung Cancer Prevention

Over 80% of lung cancers are caused by smoking. So if you’ve never smoked, then congratulations! 

If you have smoked and quit, congratulations! With every year that passes smoke-free, you lower your risk of lung cancer. If you haven’t quit yet, let this be your inspiration. 

The current recommendation by the USPTF is that people between 50-80 get screened annually for lung cancer if they are heavy smokers or heavy smokers that have quit in the last 15 years. 

If you need another reason to get screened, it’s covered under most insurance plans free of charge to you. If you get screened, you can have cancers removed very early increasing your 5-year survival rate by at least 60%. Early treatment is less costly than waiting until you have symptoms which is a sign of advanced disease.

Talk to your doctor about getting screened. Don’t have a doctor? Check out ZocDoc where you can find a doctor or specialist covered by your insurance.

If you don’t fit the criteria above, you can still be at risk. Other risk factors for lung cancer are exposure to asbestos, radon, a family history of lung cancer, etc. Your insurance should cover the test but it may not be free. It’s still cheaper than waiting until you’re symptomatic and having to get extensive treatment. So talk to your doctor about your risk factors and see if you’re eligible for screening.

READ MORE: Why should we have and see a primary care doctor?

How lung cancer is diagnosed?

Lung cancer can be found incidentally (by mistake) or because you’ve reported symptoms to your healthcare provider. 

How can it be found by mistake? Let’s say you had stomach or back pain and had an x-ray, CT scan, or MRI for the pain, the scan can catch findings in the lungs. This is called an incidental finding. Your provider will then order imaging specific to your lungs to confirm the finding.

The process is similar if you report symptoms, like a persistent cough or chest pain when laughing, to your doctor (see a full list of symptoms HERE). They’ll order imaging for your lungs.

If there’s a suspicious or concerning finding, they’ll refer you to a specialist for further workup which may include a biopsy.

Like most cancers, cancers are diagnosed by biopsy. Those biopsy results will determine whether or not you have cancer. If you do have cancer, the biopsy also lets you know what kind of cancer you have and what stage. This determines treatment. 

Will lung cancer show on an x-ray?

Yes,  it can but it’s not very reliable. Your doctor may want to start with an x-ray though because it doesn’t usually require insurance approval. 

If your x-ray is negative and you’re still having symptoms, ask about getting a CT scan. A CT scan is more precise taking hundreds of pictures of your lungs and can more readily find lung cancers. 

Lung Cancer Symptoms

A cough that does not go away or gets worse	Coughing up blood or rust-colored spit
Chest pain that is worse when breathing deeply, coughing, or laughing	Hoarseness
Loss of appetite	Unexplained weight loss
Shortness of breath	Feeling tired or weak
Respiratory infection that doesn’t go away or keeps coming back	New onset of wheezing Source:cancer.org

Lung cancer symptoms tend to appear once the cancer has spread. That’s why screening is so important – to catch it before you’re symptomatic.

Can lung cancer be cured?

Lung cancer can be cured. The first line of treatment is usually surgery to remove the affected lobe. If caught early, you could have the surgery and never need other treatment. Just regular screenings to catch new ones if they pop up.

If in later stages, you might have chemotherapy, immunotherapy, and/or target therapy with or without surgery.

Want to quit smoking? If not, why should you?

If you smoke, the best thing you can do to reduce your risk of lung cancer is to quit. You have to want to do it for you so that you have a WHY to focus on. 

Once you make the decision, you could try to do it on your own. Some people can quit cold turkey and be successful. If you can’t do it this way, there’s no shame in getting help. There are Quitlines (i.e, 1-800-784-8669), support groups, and/or you can talk to your doctor about NRT (nicotine-replacement therapy). 

A study found that “the group of [lung cancer patients] who quit lived [about] 22 months longer than the group that continued smoking…Quitting smoking was also associated with a longer time before the disease progressed”. So even if you’re diagnosed with lung cancer, you should consider smoking to increase the possibility of beating the disease. After 10 years of being smoke-free, you would decrease your risk of dying from lung cancer by half of when you were smoking.

Quitting smoking improves your heart and lung health after a year. After 5 years you decrease your risk for stroke and other cancers like cervical, mouth, throat, and bladder cancer. After 10 years, you decrease your risk for lung cancer, pancreatic cancer, and cancer of the larynx.

Hopefully, if you weren’t considering it before reading this, you’re considering it now.

Share this with the people you love so that they get screened. We can save our lives and the lives of the people we love.