It was Mortiz Kaposi who described this lesion and hence the name Kaposi’s sarcoma is given. This disorder is a tumor that develops due to endothelial cell lineage. This disease varies widely in clinical terms ranging from minimal infection like muco-cutaneous problem to damaging organs inside. Very often this condition is found assoiated with AIDS and other immune deficiency disorders.
K. Sarcoma is observed as 4 types namely immune compromised, AIDS related, sporadic and endemic.
This condition is observed in HIV infected patients, more particular when they discontinue HAART therapy. Among the 4 types, aids related sarcoma is potentially dangerous.
Symptoms :
Lesions (cutaneous) develop in almost all aids patients. There may be multiple skin lesions, tumor with lymphedema and mild to severe pain. Lesions may attack the soles of feet or it can develop anywhere in the body, including inner organs.
Gastrointestinal lesions are seen in GI tract and are generally found with advanced stage of HIV patients.
They may have difficulty in bowel movements, nausea, vomiting, and pain in abdomen, dysphagia and hematochezia.
Lesions may occur in respiratory tract causing severe cough, dyspnea, chest pain and hemoptysis.
Sometimes these lesions do not show any symptoms and can be found only through radiograph testing.
Causes :
K.Sarcoma develops due to lowered immunity patients like HIV and cancer patients. Taking powerful drugs like corticosteroids may also cause this problem.
Diagnoses :
Your doctor will take CD4 lymphocyte counting and also viral load testing on HIV infected patients for confirming the sarcoma. He may also do imaging tests like chest radiographs and gallium scanning for identifying the cancerous cells.
Pictures of Kaposi’s Sarcoma :
Images, Pics, Pictures and Photos of Kaposis Sarcoma
Treatment :
Very often, the treatment given for K. Sarcoma is associated with Highly Active Antiretroviral Therapy HAART given for Aids. This method is certainly useful for reducing the severity of illness. This is the first step in treating sarcoma patients.
Depending on the health condition and intensity of disease, your doctor will start or reset the HAART therapy again. He may also increase the CD4 for reducing the viral loading of HIV virus. This method can be combined with chemotherapy or radiation therapy on certain cases to reverse the growth of disease.
For less infected people, local therapy is given with radiation treatment. This method is ideal for managing bulky lesions which cannot be removed by cosmetic procedures.
For patients with widespread lesions, EBRT (extended field electron beam radiation therapy) is given for chronic lesions. This method is repeated for 6-8 weeks for getting better results.
Surgery is done for those who suffer from surface lesions that are superficial. But it may recur after some time. For certain patients, intra lesion therapy is given with low dosage of vincristine combined with bleomycin which is highly effective in controlling sarcoma.