Cancer, a group of diseases that cause uncontrolled growth of mutated cells in your body, kills more than 500,000 Americans each year, according to the National Cancer Institute. Bone cancer may require surgery that makes a bone graft necessary, and your oncologist may opt to use calcium sulfate in your treatment.
About Cancer
There are more than 100 types of cancer, which can affect nearly every part of your body. Broad categories of cancer include carcinoma, or cancer that impacts your skin or the tissues on the surface of your organs; sarcoma, which is cancer that begins in cartilage, fat, blood vessels, muscles, bones or connective tissues; leukemia, or cancer of the bone marrow; lymphoma and myeloma, cancers that affect immune system cells; and central nervous system cancers, which occur in spinal cord and brain tissues.
About Calcium Sulfate
Calcium sulfate is characterized as CaSO4 in chemistry terms -- it is the sulfate salt of calcium. You often find it in hydrated form as gypsum, which is a critical component of plaster of Paris. Calcium sulfate may benefit your health. It helps speed slow wound healing and may also help dry pimples, ulcers and abscesses.
Calcium Sulfate and Cancer
Calcium sulfate might prove useful for sarcoma type cancers. A study published in the September 2011 issue of "Clinics in Orthopedic Surgery" investigated 56 patients with bone tumors who had undergone bone surgery and found that calcium sulfate injected into bone is a lower cost and comparably effective alternative to bone grafting. While most bone tumors are non-cancerous, some tumors are cancerous and potentially life-threatening.
Traditional Treatment for Cancerous Bone Tumors
Non-surgical treatment of cancerous bone tumors includes radiation and chemotherapy. Radiation relies on high-dose x-rays as a means of shrinking tumors and killing cancer cells. Chemotherapy is a drug that kills cancer cells. Your oncologist may also suggest surgery to remove sections of cancerous bone, which may require a bone graft to replace the removed tissue, or amputation of a limb.
References
- National Cancer Institute: What Is Cancer?
- The Free Dictionary: Calcium
- BiochemicCellSalts.com: The 12 Biochemic Cell (Tissue) Salts
- Clinics in Orthopedic Surgery: Grafting Using Injectable Calcium Sulfate in Bone Tumor Surgery: Comparison with Demineralized Bone Matrix-based Grafting
- American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons: Bone Tumor
- American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons: Giant Cell Tumor of Bone
