Cancer
disease
Cancer is an abnormal growth of cells in the body that reproduce in a rapid or unusual pattern and are capable of invading other tissues. These malignant tumors differ from benign tumors which are non-cancerous.
There are over one hundred types of cancer, usually named for the organ, tissue or cell type they originate in. Several major types are leukemia, which starts in the blood or blood-forming tissues, sarcoma which originates in connective tissues or supportive tissues, carcinoma, which begins in tissues that line organs or the skin, and lymphoma and myeloma which start in the immune system.
Cancer as a whole group is estimated to have caused the death of over half a million individuals in the United States in 2008. Nonmelanoma skin cancer is the most common type, reflecting about 50% of all cancer diagnoses. Bladder cancer, colon and rectal cancer (commonly combined as colorectal cancer) and prostate cancer are common as well.
Derived from Latin, Cancer means “crab.”
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