When is testicular cancer not curable

Good prognosis means that the seminoma has spread only to the lymph nodes or the lungs. It has not spread anywhere else. Intermediate prognosis means that the seminoma has spread beyond the lung or lymph nodes. It has spread to other parts of the body, such as the brain or liver. There are three categories of outlook for non seminoma testicular cancer that has spread. These are good prognosis, intermediate prognosis and poor prognosis.

Good prognosis means that your primary cancer was in your testicle, or at the back of your stomach or abdomen retroperitoneal. It may have spread to the lungs or lymph nodes, but has not spread to anywhere else in your body. Your markers are only slightly above normal S1 in the TNM staging system. Intermediate prognosis is the same as good prognosis.

But your markers are higher. They are moderately above normal S2 in the TNM staging system. The terms 1 year survival and 5 year survival don't mean that you will only live for 1 or 5 years. They watch what happens to people with cancer in the years after their diagnosis. But some people live much longer than this. Taking part in clinical trials can help to improve the outlook for people with testicular cancer. You can read more statistics on survival rates and other factors for testicular cancer in our Cancer Statistics section.

Testicular cancer is cancer that develops in the testicles. The testicles are part of the male reproductive system. We don't know what causes most testicular cancers.

But some factors can increase your risk of getting it. Men with Stage IA and IB disease are often followed closely with surveillance, although chemotherapy or retroperitoneal lymph node dissection RPLND are options to minimize the risk of recurrence. Men with stage IS cancer have their tumor confined to the testicle, but elevated tumor markers after orchiectomy.

Men with Stage IS disease require chemotherapy for cure. If the cancer has spread to the retroperitoneal lymph nodes, it is known as regional spread.

Men with regional spread have Stage II disease. If cancer has spread beyond the lymph nodes, it is termed distant metastatic disease.

Now I do everything I can to keep myself healthy. I never smoked, but I quit drinking soon after my initial diagnosis. Testicular cancer is a relatively rare type, expected to account for just 9, of the 1.

It is also a highly treatable type. The five-year survival rate is more than 95 percent, far higher than the overall five-year adult cancer survival rate 68 percent.

For patients who receive a diagnosis when the tumor remains confined to a single testicle — and most patients do — the long-term effects of the disease tend to be minimal. Recurrence is rare, and the lifetime risk of a new cancer in the second testicle is 2 to 5 percent. Most of those patients always retain a single working testicle, which in many cases can produce enough testosterone and sperm to keep them healthy and fertile for many years.

The chances of long-term problems are far greater for patients who, at diagnosis, have metastatic cancer that has already spread beyond a single testicle and its immediate environs. Such patients naturally face a higher risk of death from their initial cancer and a higher risk of recurrence, but specialists say the biggest risks stem less from the cancer than from the chemicals used to treat it.

This powerful combination routinely produces all the harsh side effects associated with chemotherapy, but it can also lead to a litany of long-term side effects: infertility, low testosterone, lung scarring, hypertension, coronary artery disease, metabolic syndrome and secondary cancers. These treatment-related conditions are relatively rare in patients who get chemotherapy for other tumor types. Most cancers tend to strike people who are beyond an age when they might worry either about fertility or problems that take decades to develop.

The average age of a typical patient with cancer upon initial diagnosis is Long-term effects pose a much greater risk to the survivors of testicular cancer because they tend to be much younger.

Feldman, M. For most men, sperm production gradually recovers over months and years.