General Surgery
I’ve recently been diagnosed with colorectal cancer and my doctor wants me to see a surgical oncologist. How is a surgical oncologist different from other surgeons?
A surgical oncologist is a surgeon, who has completed additional fellowship training in the diagnosis and treatment of cancer. A surgical oncologist is not the same as a medical oncologist or a radiation oncologist. Neither medical nor radiation oncologists performcancer surgery. Instead, they provide chemotherapy and radiation therapy for cancer patients. Depending on the type and stage of cancer involved, medical and radiation oncologists may work with a surgical oncologist to provide additional therapy following cancer surgery.
A surgical oncologist’s training requires broad knowledge of non-surgical cancer treatments, expertise in the benefits of a multi-disciplinary approach to cancer therapy and extensive experience in the surgical management of cancer, including having been either the surgeon or first assistant surgeon on a minimum of 120 cancer-related surgical procedures.
Because of their additional training and experience, surgical oncologists can sometimes offer more advanced surgical techniques or a better array of surgical options for the treatment of an individual’s cancer. With early stage colorectal cancer, for example, surgical oncologists can performa laparoscopic colectomy during which the surgeon makes several small incisions in the abdomen to remove the diseased tissue. The advantages of this procedure include less pain for the patient, a shorter hospital stay and a quicker recovery from surgery.
Surgical oncologists are also trained to recognize how surgery is just one component of overall treatment for cancer. A surgical oncologist will work with other cancer specialists to develop a combined treatment approach for each patient that includes the best surgical option along with other therapies such as radiotherapy, chemotherapy, immunotherapy and endocrine therapy. By combining all of these modalities, it’s possible to have a reasonable expectation of actually curing an individual’s cancer by removing the cancer from the body and then following that with therapies to help insure that cancer does not re-occur.
In our practice, we place tremendous emphasis on the importance of followup care of patients. Although it’s possible to rid a patient of cancer for the rest of his or her life, some cancers will return. The risk of cancer re-occurrence is highest during the first two years following surgery. For that reason, we schedule our patients for follow-up visits every four months during that time. If a cancer does return, this allows us to find it early, which increases the ability to permanently remove the cancer. During years two through five, we’ll schedule follow-up visits for every six months, and then annually for the rest of the patient’s life.
Because surgical oncology is a relatively new specialty, there aren’t enough surgical oncologists to treat every cancer patient. Many general surgeons have the ability and experience to successfully performsurgery for common cancer malignancies. But if your case is complex, your cancer is a type that is uncommon, or you are just looking to make sure you have the latest and most innovative surgical techniques that are available, you may want to consult with a surgical oncologist.
Originally Published in The University Doctors' MedicaLink - 4/09
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