Can panceatic cancer spread?!
Question: to the lungs? My mom had pneumonia at the beginning of the month, and was on antibiodics. She wasn't doing well last weekend, and my husband took her back to the hospital. Afew days ago she was coughing up blood. Today she is going for CT scans. Just wondering if pneumonia would look the same as cancer on the chest x-rays she had.
Answers: to the lungs? My mom had pneumonia at the beginning of the month, and was on antibiodics. She wasn't doing well last weekend, and my husband took her back to the hospital. Afew days ago she was coughing up blood. Today she is going for CT scans. Just wondering if pneumonia would look the same as cancer on the chest x-rays she had.
Yes, pancreatic cancer can spread to the lungs. Any cancer can spread just about anywhere if it is metastatic.
Cancer and pneumonia don't look the same on a CT scan, however. Pneumonia is going to look like a semi-even distribution of fluid around the lungs (like a dark shadow) and lung cancer (assuming it has spread) is going to look like a tumor--a centralized lump on a lung. Your doctor should be able to tell them apart, but some times the do look similar (some lumps are fluidlike and some fluid can stick together, looking lump-like). But that's why they have radiologists to read he scan for you.
I'm afraid it's possible -- all types of cancer can metastasize to other organs.