User:Cancerindia/sandbox

AIM

The cancer burden in India is already high (approximately 1 million new cases in 2012) and is expected to rise even more with increasing life expectancy and changes in lifestyles associated with economic development. There is no comprehensive web-portal in India that provides information on common cancers in our country. It has thus become a prime requisite to design such an India-centric cancer portal.

"India Battles Cancer" is a portal that provides information on the leading cancers in India with a major focus on awareness, prevention and treatment of these cancers. The portal currently focuses on information for the general public and patients and will be upgraded in the near future to include relevant details for health care providers.

What is Cancer? Cancer is a general name for a group of diseases where normal cells due to some reason become abnormal and grow in an uncontrolled fashion. Untreated cancers cause serious illness, disability and death.

Not all growths (tumours) are cancerous. They can be benign (not cancerous) or malignant (cancerous). Benign tumours are slow-growing and not as dangerous as malignant tumours which usually grow rapidly and may spread to other body sites.

How does cancer spread? Cancer may spread by directly invading the adjacent organs. Cancer cells often travel to other parts of the body by getting into the body’s blood stream/lymphatic vessels, where they grow and form new tumours. The process of cancer spread is called metastasis or invasion.