Although the statement Patrick Swayze's publicist issued says he is upbeat about his diagnosis, experts say pancreatic cancer is one of the deadliest of all tumors.
Only 4% of patients are alive after five years, says Mace Rothenberg, a professor at the Vanderbilt-Ingram Cancer Center in Nashville.
The American Cancer Society estimates that 37,680 Americans will be diagnosed with the disease this year and that 34,290 will die of it, which makes it the fourth-leading cause of cancer death.
The disease is typically a silent killer, producing no symptoms until it has metastasized, or spread around the body, Rothenberg says. It also tends to spread very early. And unlike diseases such as cervical cancer and colon cancer, there are also no proven ways to catch pancreatic cancer early.
Because the tumor grows so aggressively, only about 20% of patients are eligible for surgery, Rothenberg says. The tumors often resist treatment with drugs as well. The Food and Drug Administration approved the drug Tarceva in 2005. About 40% of patients are treated with both Tarceva and the older chemotherapy drug Gemzar. Neither is considered a cure.
At 55, Swayze is much younger than the average pancreatic cancer patient, says Teri Brentnall of the University of Washington, who leads a screening program for high-risk families. Most patients are diagnosed in their 60s or 70s. Those diagnosed younger often have a genetic predisposition.
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