Читать книгу Overcome the Challenges of Cancer Care - M. D. Rosenberg - Страница 12

If a patient presents with a painless swollen gland or a painless mass, this is often a red flag for doctors. A red-flag symptom is of particular concern to doctors; it’s a symptom that’s more worrisome than the average symptom we see in clinic.

Red-flag symptoms may include headaches that wake someone up at night, unexplained night sweats or weight loss, and painless swollen masses, among others.

Notice how many of these red-flag symptoms are nonspecific. They might not even signal a cancer diagnosis; they could be caused by something else. A red-flag symptom is only one piece of a puzzle. Having one of these symptoms does not mean a person has cancer.

What red flags do offer is a key but subtle way to figure out whether a patient has something like Bob (an infection) or Sarah (a cancer). This method isn’t perfect. Some patients have both a cancer and an infection. In fact, some cancers make getting an infection more likely. Again, this is why diagnosing cancer is so hard (and why doctors go to school for so long).