Staging
Also known as: stage, cancer stage
The process of finding out how large a cancer is and whether it has spread.
Definition
Staging is the process of working out how far a cancer has progressed: the size of the primary tumour, whether nearby lymph nodes are involved, and whether it has spread (metastasised) to distant organs. Staging combines examination, imaging (CT, MRI, PET-CT, ultrasound), biopsies and sometimes surgery.
Most solid cancers are staged using the international TNM system, which is then summarised into stages I to IV. Staging is the single most important factor in choosing treatment and in estimating prognosis, so it is completed before treatment begins.
See also
- TNM Staging — The international system that describes cancer by tumour size (T), node involvement (N) and metastasis (M).
- Metastasis — Cancer that has spread from where it started to another part of the body.
- Grade — A score from the pathologist describing how abnormal the cancer cells look under the microscope.
- Prognosis — A doctor's best estimate of how a cancer is likely to behave and respond to treatment.
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Medically reviewed by
Dr. Rehan Abdullah
Dr. Rehan Abdullah is a dual-trained clinical and radiation oncologist with over a decade of experience treating both solid tumours and hematologic malignancies. He serves as Consultant Oncologist at INMOL Hospital and sees patients at Farooq Hospital and Healthnox Medical Center, Lahore. Read full profile →
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