What are the symptoms of late stage nasopharyngeal carcinoma and how to treat it

What are the symptoms of advanced nasopharyngeal cancer? How is it treated?

The early symptoms of nasopharyngeal carcinoma are not obvious and are often easily ignored, while the late symptoms are relatively obvious and easier to detect.

The main symptoms are as follows:

1. Swollen cervical lymph nodes: The tumor metastasizes to the cervical lymph nodes, with an incidence rate as high as 79.37%, and can metastasize unilaterally or bilaterally. The swollen lymph nodes in the neck are painless and hard, and in the late stage they are adhered and fixed to the skin or deep tissues.

2. Eye symptoms: If the tumor invades the orbit or eye-related nerves, visual impairment or even blindness, visual defects, diplopia, protrusion of the eyeball and limited movement, neuroparalytic keratitis, etc. Optic nerve atrophy and edema can be seen in fundus examination.

3. Symptoms of cranial nerve damage: As nasopharyngeal carcinoma infiltrates the surrounding area, any cranial nerve compression will cause corresponding symptoms and signs. However, the trigeminal nerve, abducens nerve, glossopharyngeal nerve, and hypoglossal nerve are more affected, while the facial nerve, olfactory nerve, and auditory nerve are less affected.

4. Distant metastasis: NPC can metastasize to various parts of the body, but it is common in bones, lungs, and liver. Multiple organs can metastasize at the same time. The corresponding manifestations appear due to the different metastatic sites.

5. Cachexia: terminal manifestations, death, sudden bleeding.