Your doctors look at different factors to help decide which treatments are likely to work best for you.
Treatment overview
For most people, treatment is given to help control symptoms and to slow the growth of mesothelioma. Pleural and peritoneal mesothelioma are treated in different ways.
Treatment for pleural mesothelioma
Treatments may include chemotherapy, radiotherapy, and other treatments to manage the physical impacts of cancer. Treatments to manage symptoms are sometimes called supportive therapies. Very occasionally, if mesothelioma is diagnosed before it has spread or if it has only spread to nearby tissues, surgery may be an option. This is not common as mesothelioma has usually spread before diagnosis.
Treatment for peritoneal mesothelioma
Treatment may include chemotherapy, and treatments to manage symptoms (supportive therapies). Very occasionally surgery may be an option.
If you are having surgery for peritoneal mesothelioma, your doctor may suggest having chemotherapy into the tummy (abdomen) during the surgery. This is called HIPEC (hyperthermic intraperitoneal chemotherapy).
See also
Clinical trials
Cancer research trials are carried out to try to find new and better treatments for cancer. Trials that involve patients are known as clinical trials.
Doctors are researching whether other types of treatments called targeted therapies and immunotherapies may be helpful to treat mesothelioma. These drugs may be given as part of a clinical trial.
How we can help
If you have cancer, you may be able to get a Macmillan Grant to help with the extra costs of cancer. Find out who can apply and how to access our grants.