pancreatic cancer

Had pain upper back and under bra area. Went to doc for something else and told her about it then 8 got a cat scan an there it was

@valerina30
Had similar pain, got only an x-ray and told it was my arthritis. Had CT later for having quit smoking 15 years earlier and there it was. Confirmed by PET scan & later by Mayo EUS, PET & CT scans.

I had upper back pain and thought my gall bladder was acting up. I went to my dr who ordered a CT scan. Before I got those results, my skin and whites of my eyes turned yellow. My urine was very dark and stool was light colored. I was admitted through ER; pancreatic cancer was confirmed through esophageal biopsy. But I have been cancer free for almost 2 years after 24 weeks of chemo and Whipple surgery. Best wishes to you.

One of the difficulties with pancreatic cancer is that early disease often causes few or no obvious symptoms. Symptoms tend to appear as the tumor grows.

Common warning signs include:

Jaundice — yellow skin or eyes, often with dark urine, pale stools or itching
Unexplained weight loss or loss of appetite
Upper abdominal pain, sometimes radiating into the back
New digestive problems, nausea or vomiting
Persistent fatigue
New-onset diabetes, particularly later in life, or unexpectedly worsening blood-sugar control
Sometimes changes in bowel movements related to poor digestion

I had raised hives off & on for 4 yrs. Finally started turning yellow on they did surgery for a blocked bile duck. The hives did go away.
They found the smallest spot of cancer on my pancreas that the doctor had ever seen.
I started chemo twice a week for 6 month's. Soon after the chemo was done I started itching Again. They went in and found my bile duck blocked and put a stint inside the other stint!
They did see that the cancer on the pancreas was dead.
I had Wipple surgery 2 weeks later. I’m wondering if they could’ve figured out the hives from the blocked bile duck earlier if I would have made the difference!???

What can be done to detect this disease earlier? Latest data I saw indicates this is #3 cancer killer, barely behind colon cancer. Treat it like colonoscopy with a scan at 50? Is every 10 years too far apart? Read the scan by AI? I sit here wondering what I can do to be a change agent and am stymied.

I had swollen feet so I went in and after a CT they discovered blood clots and a mass. Later to be determined as cancer

@mookiehouston I learned a lot from this article about pancreatic cancer early detection. It actually has a short questionnaire for early detection help. Let me know what you think?
https://pancan.org/facing-pancreatic-cancer/diagnosis/early-detection/