Chemotherapy Side Effects: Skin

Video Transcript

"Hello, I'm Dr. David Cathcart. I'm a Family Practice Physician from Heartland Regional Medical Center in St. Joseph and we're going to talk about chemotherapy drugs and their side effects, today. Chemotherapy kills cancer cells by interfering with the cells ability to rapidly divide. These cancer cells are cells that are rapidly dividing. If we have a skin cancer, the cells in that skin in that particular area are rapidly dividing. So the topical agent will kill those cells causing a big sore. If you extend the definition of skin to mean things like the skin inside of your mouth or the skin inside of your vagina or even the skin inside of your GI tract; from your rectum all the way up; those cells are also rapidly dividing and so you'll get the side effects associated with that. For example, sores inside of your mouth; sores inside of your vagina; sores inside your colon or irritation inside your colon causing diarrhea and nausea and vomiting. Some people know that if they're going through chemotherapy will tell you that their skin changes colors. I've even heard people say their skin turns green or gray. Well, there's no question; if there's a different, there's a, there's a look of healthy skin, someone whose healthy and a look of someone whose not healthy in their skin. Even as physicians we tend to look at the color of the skin to get an overall assessment of someone's health. If you have a fever for example, your skin will be red or flushed. If you're anemic, your skin will be pale. So, the color of the skin can be reflected by the side effects that are going on as a result of your cancer treatment. For example, if there's an infection associated with this, your skin maybe flushed and red. There's some, some side effects to some of the chemicals for example, Cortizone is sometimes use or Prednisone and that tends to cause flushing of the skin. These skin changes are usually reflective of the amount of blood supply that's, that goes to the skin as a result of the side effects of the medications or as to where you are in your illness. This is Dr. Cathcart talking to you about the side effects of chemotherapy on skin."