The Heterogeneity of Grade 3 (High grade) Neuroendocrine Neoplasms

The Heterogeneity of Grade 3 (High grade) Neuroendocrine Neoplasms

Awareness, Patient Advocacy
Reviewed and updated 14th March 2022High Grade - the forgotten patient group?When reading articles in the mainstream media, found in medical publications; and even listening to doctors speak about my disease, it's clear that the focus is on the term "Neuroendocrine Tumours" or NET for short.  Many websites of advocate foundation organisations and specialist scientific organisations, all still use the term "NET" in their naming.  I too am guilty of having a large Facebook site falling into this category.  It's little wonder that those with high grade disease can often feel like the forgotten patient group.  Clearly all the aforementioned organisations support all patients regardless of grade, but it's true to say that the naming and general use of terminology continues to fall behind. It's also true that the term…
Read More
Chemotherapy for Neuroendocrine Cancer

Chemotherapy for Neuroendocrine Cancer

Treatment
Edited and checked December 2022One of the unusual aspects of Neuroendocrine Cancer is that chemotherapy is not normally considered as a 'standard' or first-line treatment, unlike many other cancers. One exception is high grade (Grade 3) where it is very often a first and/or second-line therapy. This is particularly the case with poorly differentiated Neuroendocrine disease, by default labelled as Neuroendocrine Carcinoma (NEC). Many people think Chemotherapy has a short life span due to recent advances in medical science, some citing Immunotherapy as its replacement. However, it's far too early to write off chemotherapy which is still used in many scenarios and remains a tool in the arsenal of treatments for many cancer types and is predicted to do for some time yet. See more informed reporting about this below.Interest point…
Read More