Lung Cancer: Know The Signs, Reduce Your Risk

Lung cancer is the leading cause of cancer deaths in the United States. Getting a diagnosis of lung cancer can be scary, especially when you don’t know what to expect.

To help, a Franciscan Health lung cancer expert explores what lung cancer is, along with its causes, risk factors and key symptoms.

What Is Lung Cancer?

Lung cancer occurs when cells in the lung mutate and grow out of control. Lung cancer can spread to nearby lymph nodes and organs such as the brain, which is known as metastatic lung cancer.

What Are The Three Types Of Lung Cancer?

According to the American Lung Association, the three kinds of lung cancer are:

• Non-small cell lung cancer: makes up about 80% of cases and typically spreads more slowly than small cell lung cancer
• Small cell lung cancer: usually linked to smoking and treated with chemotherapy
• Carcinoid lung cancer: typically, the slowest growing and least common type

What Causes Lung Cancer?

About 90% of lung cancers in the United States are caused by smoking or secondhand smoke, according to the American Lung Association. Genetics and exposure to radon, particle pollution and other hazardous chemicals can also play a role in lung cancer development.

Does smoking weed cause lung cancer?

The American Cancer Society says there are reasons to think smoking marijuana might increase your lung cancer risk, including tar content. Also, holding marijuana smoke in the lungs for a long time gives any cancer-causing substances more opportunity to deposit in the lungs.

It’s been hard to formally study whether there is a scientific link between marijuana and lung cancer because marijuana has been illegal in many places for so long, and it’s not easy to gather information about the use of illegal drugs. More research is needed to determine the lung cancer risks from smoking marijuana.

Does vaping cause lung cancer?

Many vaping products and e-cigarettes contain nicotine, so the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) classifies them as “tobacco products.”  The FDA states that e-cigarettes cause health risks, including lung damage. Furthermore, e-cigarettes have not been shown to improve your chances of quitting smoking. Whether e-cigarettes directly increase your risk of lung cancer is not yet known.

Am I At Higher Risk For Lung Cancer?

The most common risk factors for lung cancer include:

Risk factors you can control

• Smoking. About 80% of lung cancer deaths are thought to result from smoking, according to the American Cancer Society. About 14.2 million Americans qualify as high risk for lung cancer because they are between 50 and 80 years old and have a 20 pack-year smoking history -- a number determined by multiplying the years one has smoked by the number of cigarettes per day.

• Secondhand smoke. Even if you don’t smoke, exposure to secondhand smoke puts you at a higher risk of lung cancer later.
• Radon exposure. Radon is the leading cause of lung cancer among people who don’t smoke and the second-leading cause of lung cancer in the United States.
• Exposure to asbestos and other cancer-causing agents in the workplace.

Risk factors you cannot control

• Family history. People whose parents or siblings have had lung cancer are at higher risk of lung cancer.
• Personal history of lung cancer. People who have had lung cancer before are more likely to develop lung cancer again.
• Air pollution. According to the American Cancer Society, a small percentage (1% to 2%) of all deaths from lung cancer in the United States are thought to be due to outdoor air pollution.
• Previous radiation therapy to the lungs.

What Are The Signs Of Lung Cancer?

“Unfortunately, the most common symptom of lung cancer is really no symptoms at all,” said Cory Hogue, MD, a Munster, Ind., radiation oncologist with the Franciscan Health Cancer Center Munster. “It takes a certain volume or size of tumor before it would cause any symptoms.

“But for some people that present with symptoms, certainly if you had a cough that doesn't get better, if you're coughing up blood, if you're losing weight, if you're short of breath, these are all reasons to go to your primary care doctor and do some additional investigation.”

Other signs of lung cancer may include:

• Wheezing
• Numerous lung infections
• Hoarseness
• Loss of appetite
• Headaches
• Coughing up blood
• Persistent chest pain
• Worsening, persistent cough
• Shortness of breath
• Blood clots
• Bone pain
• Bone fractures

Is Lung Cancer Screening Available?

Doctors have had access to a lung cancer screening tool for nearly a decade that can catch this type of cancer for early treatment, called a lung scan or lung CT.

To help catch lung cancer in its early stages, the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force recommends you get screened for lung cancer each year if you’re aged 50 to 80 and you have or have had a 20-pack-year smoking habit within the past 15 years. (Learn more about what your lung scan results mean.)

How Is Lung Cancer Diagnosed?

In addition to lung CT scans, lung cancer may be diagnosed with:

• Positron emission tomography (PET) scan
• Biopsy
• Ultrasound
• Needle or mucous (saliva) sample

Any tissue samples from these tests are analyzed in a lab to determine if the cells are cancerous.

What Are The Stages Of Lung Cancer?

The stages of small cell lung cancer include:

• Limited stage: may or may not have spread to nearby lymph nodes
• Extended stage: has spread outside the lung to nearby tissues or organs

Non-small cell lung cancer stages include:

• Stage 0: located on the top lining of the lung or air tube and hasn’t spread
• Stage 1: still contained within the lung and hasn’t spread
• Stage 2: tumors are larger than stage 1 tumors and/or have begun to spread to nearby lymph nodes
• Stage 3: typically has spread to lymph nodes located between the chest and lungs
• Stage 4: has spread to different lung lining layers and/or throughout the body

Early detection of lung cancer is important for survival.

How Is Lung Cancer Treated?

“For the small percentage of people where we do unfortunately find cancer, we do have many, many treatment options available,” Dr. Hogue said.

Lung cancer treatments include:

• Surgery to remove the cancer
• Chemotherapy and radiation
• Immunotherapy drugs
• Targeted gene and protein therapy
• Palliative care
• Complementary therapies

“Whenever doctors come together and decide the best treatment option, we have to consider the cell of origin, because they respond to different treatments, and it can impact the recommendations that a patient would get,” Dr. Hogue said.

How Long Can You Live With Lung Cancer?

According to the National Cancer Institute, the overall 5-year lung cancer survival rate between 2013 and 2019 was 25.4%, but this varied significantly by stage:

• Localized cancer that hadn’t spread beyond the lungs: 62.8%
• Regional cancer that has spread to nearby lymph nodes: 34.8%
• Distant cancer that spread to different places throughout the body: 8.2%
• Unknown cancer spread: 15.1%

Early detection is key to better lung cancer outcomes.

The CDC says living with lung cancer means working closely with your doctor to put in place the most effective treatment plan for you, as well as taking steps to stay healthy and plan for your future and your loved ones.

HealthDay News contributed information to this article.