Cancer treatments have increased the survival rate of people. However, many cancer medicines and radiotherapy have been linked to heart damage. Terming these treatments as a double-edged sword. For instance, radiation therapy can cause heart attack, heart failure, and arrhythmias, while chemotherapy agents are associated with damage in heart blood vessels, or cause blood clots. Development of few of these heart conditions occurs during the cancer treatment, whereas few develop long after.
It is known that most cancer drugs cause some adverse effect on the cardiovascular system. Recently, it has been observed that with new cancer drugs there is an increase in the amount of cardiac toxicity. Having established this correlation, cardiologists suggest continuous monitoring of heart functioning before, during and after the treatment. This can help pickup small hints of any damage caused to…
