Rosie Posted December 9, 2003 Share Posted December 9, 2003 Hi everyone, We are still new to all of this. My mother is going for another scan today and a few other appts. before we know more details. I've heard a lot people talk about mets. What exactly is that? Thanks and blessings to all of you. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
john Posted December 9, 2003 Share Posted December 9, 2003 mets are short for metastasis. It means the cancer has spread from the primary tumor to another organ. Basically a tumor can be primary or secondary. The primary cancer is where the cancer started. The secondary is the tumor that has metastasized For example a person may have lung cancer (primary) and a brain met(s) (secondary). The brain tumor is not brain cancer it is lung cancer that has spread (metastasized) to the brain. http://www.cancerhelp.org.uk/help/default.asp?page=101 Hope this helps answer your questions. The link above may help also Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rosie Posted December 10, 2003 Author Share Posted December 10, 2003 Thank you for your help. Yesterday my mom went for the cat scan to check the rest of her body. They called yesterday afternoon to tell her they have spotted a trauma to the brain and scheduled an MRI for tomorrow. Trauma? Does that mean that it may have spread? When I hear trauma I think someone has been hit in the head. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
beckyg Posted December 10, 2003 Share Posted December 10, 2003 It just means there is something that showed up on the scan and they can't be sure what it is without further tests. Becky Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted December 11, 2003 Share Posted December 11, 2003 I have a related question - how do they know when a tumor in another organ is a met? How can they tell it's from Lung cancer and not a primary cancer? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cary Posted December 11, 2003 Share Posted December 11, 2003 To answer your question, they would have to perform a biopsy. Cary Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
john Posted December 11, 2003 Share Posted December 11, 2003 They have to do a biopsy and the correct stainings or whatever tests they do (I don't know what they are). Adenocarcinoma can be a primary lung or a primary colon cancer. CDX2 can be used to differentiate the two from what I have read. Sometimes it is even less clear and people have "unknown primary" Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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