What is the Survival Rate of a Mesothelioma Patient? As yet, there is no universally adopted protocol for screening those exposed to asbestos. The levels of serum osteopontin may be useful, and doctors have recently begun testing the Mesomark assay, which measures levels of soluble mesothelin-related proteins (SMRPs), which diseased mesothelioma cells release.

While moderate gains in prognosis from new chemotherapy methods and multimodality treatments have been realized, the prognosis for malignant mesothelioma continues to be discouraging.Chemotherapy is the only treatment methodology that has been proven — in randomized and controlled trials — to improve survival rates and timeframes.

In a 2003 study by Nicholas Vogelzang M.D. (Nevada Comprehensive Cancer Center), improving median survival from 10 months in the control group to months in the group of patients treated with chemotherapy and vitamin supplements.

Despite advances in medical technology and methodology, the outlook is still, on the whole, discouraging. Among specific subsets of patients with favorable prognostic factors, multimodality treatments — incoporating surgery, chemotherapy and radiation — have resulted in significant extension of the survival window (3-14 years), but on the whole, even the most cutting-edge multimodal treatments demonstrate, at best, modest improvement (median survival of months, with only 29.6% surviving two years or longer).

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