Diagnosed With Bone Cancer. Noticed Swelling In Shoulder And Pain In Spine. Worrisome

Posted on Tue, 6 Nov 2012

Question: My grand mother was diagnised last week and got confirmed that she has bone cancer.

she has swollen shoulder and pain in spine. Doctors told it is in Adv stage.

I am attaching MRI and other reports to this query please let me know how we can proceed.

Thanks in advance

Answered by Dr. Indranil Ghosh (4 hours later)

Dear XXXXXXX,

I am sorry to hear about your grandmother.

It appears that she is bedridden and has a malignancy (cancer) which has involved numerous bones of the body. The source is not very clear but primary bone sarcoma at this age is quite rare. It may be a sarcoma arising from some other site like limbs or abdomen which has spread to the bones, or else some other kind of cancer (carcinoma from lung, breast or myeloma).

It is important to do a needle biopsy to establish the exact diagnosis as for some of these conditions (like myeloma or breast cancer metastatic) there are treatments to prolong her life and decrease symptoms. However if it is still a metastatic sarcoma then expected survival is very low.

You can take the opinion from a good cancer center near your place for further advice.

Hope I have answered your query. I will be available for further follow-up queries, if any.

Note: For further queries related to kidney problems Click here.

Above answer was peer-reviewed by : Dr. Chakravarthy Mazumdar