UCC symposium on rare cancer open to public
One of the speakers at the meeting, which is free and open to the public, will be RTÉ’s Northern correspondent Tommie Gorman, who was treated for an advanced carcinoid tumour in the late 1990s.
He has undergone many types of treatment while working as a journalist and is very involved inpatient advocacy.
Dr Derek Power, an oncologist at Mercy University Hospital — one of the main speakers — said the aim of the meeting was to alert the public to all aspects of these diseases.
“The symposium brings together a group of national and international experts to discuss the latest treatments as well as to gather information so the true incidence and prevalence as well as outcomes can be recorded,” Dr Power said.
The organisers have secured funding for a national database, which they hope will bring all physicians treating this disease together.
A special forum will also take place in The Boole Hall, where patients and their families will discuss their experience of these diseases with each other and with individual international experts.
“Neuroendocrine (carcinoid) tumours are relatively uncommon, slow-growing tumours. The incidence is approximately 250 cases per year in Ireland. However, the prevalence is likely to be much greater because there are probably thousands of people living their lives with this diagnosis,” Dr Power said. The most common sites of these diseases are the gastrointestinal tract — small bowel, appendix, stomach and pancreas.
Symptoms include increased insulin production leading to low blood sugars, facial flushing, wheezing or diarrhoea due to increased serotonin production. Many cases present with no symptoms at all and are diagnosed incidentally.
Dr Power said treatment invariably includes surgery, but can also include drugs that inhibit hormone production, chemotherapy, radioactive drug therapy, interventional x-ray treatment and more modern targeted biologic therapy.
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