Often, treatment for ovarian cancer involves more than one modality. Surgery is usually the initial treatment for ovarian cancer. If the surgeon determines that the cancer has spread, a procedure known as debulking will most likely be attempted. In the earliest stages of ovarian cancer, surgery may be able to completely remove the tumor and additional therapies may not be needed. Because these drugs not only affect the cancer cells, but also target healthy cells, they may produce unwanted side effects.
Medications are available to help control the side effects associated with chemotherapy.
Your physician will discuss with you which chemotherapy drugs are most likely to eradicate your remaining cancer. Chemotherapy is generally administered in cycles, meaning that you will receive the drugs for a specified period of time and then you will be given another period of time to recover. Chemotherapy may be administered as an outpatient or it may require an overnight hospital stay. Clinical trials, aimed at finding new ways to fight ovarian cancer, are currently studying the administration of chemotherapy directly into the abdomen. It is anticipated that this approach will fight the cancer directly.