Chemotherapy

At Diablo Valley Oncology / Hematology Medical Group, we administer all forms of therapy in our beautiful new infusion suite. Our nurses are all certified and a medical practitioner is always on site when treatment is delivered. We administer standard agents, experimental agents, and supportive drugs, allowing almost all of our patients to remain out of the hospital. The newest antiemetics have relegated nausea to a problem from history. Supportive drugs reduce the incidence of low blood counts and fevers, and intravenous antibiotics can be delivered as an outpatient, if necessary. Although unwanted side effects are still present, their intensity is markedly diminished from ten or twenty years ago, which has allowed the widespread delivery of chemotherapy in many more sub-types of cancer. The physicians at Diablo Valley Oncology / Hematology Medical Group treat all types of cancers, and almost all of those treatments can be delivered within our premises.

Chemotherapy is the term used for drugs that kill cancer cells. In fact, these days, the term usually includes biologic or immunologic agents, also called targeted agents. In general, chemotherapy functions by interfering with a cells ability to reproduce, often by disrupting DNA replication. The side effects are noted because the drugs are active against both abnormal (malignant) cells and normal tissue. Targeted agents act on specific proteins which are on the malignant cells, but not on normal cells; often, this reduces the incidence of serious side effects.In many cancers, chemotherapy has markedly increased cure rates, length of life, and our palliative ability (relief or prevention of symptoms caused by cancer).