Treatment options

 

Surgery is one of the main treatments for ovarian cancer and the type of surgery that you have will depend on the extent of your cancer and how far it has spread. It is likely that you will not have a confirmed cancer diagnosis until after surgery.

Operations can last up to six hours and following surgery you are likely to be in hospital for five to seven days.

If your cancer has not spread outside of your ovaries, your surgery may remove:

 

• Both ovaries and the fallopian tubes
• Your cervix and your womb

 

The surgeon may offer a frozen section; this is where the abnormal ovaries are sent to the lab and quickly analysed during your operation to see if you have a diagnosis of cancer.

If your cancer has spread to other parts of your body, you may need more surgery to remove as much as possible. This may include removing parts of your bowel, omentum (fat around the stomach) and lymph nodes in the abdomen and the pelvis. It may not be possible to remove all of your cancer, but the surgeons will remove as much as possible.

If the cancer has spread to the bowel, you may need to have a section of it removed. Sometimes the surgeons cannot safely join the remaining pieces of the bowel together and you will need a stoma. This brings the end of your bowel out through your tummy and you wear a bag over it to collect your poo.

Your medical team will talk to you about all of the possibilities before you have surgery. This will include discussing the impact on your fertility and possible early menopause if you are still getting periods.

Find out more about cancer surgery at Royal Surrey.

 

Your medical team may decide you need chemotherapy as your first treatment. If this is the case you will have had a biopsy to confirm cancer first. Normally two different chemotherapy drugs are given and after three cycles you will have a CT scan to review how well the chemotherapy has worked. You may then have surgery.

You may also have chemotherapy after surgery. You will have up to a maximum of six to eight cycles.

Discover more about receiving chemotherapy at Royal Surrey Cancer Centre.

 

Most patients will be offered a BRCA genetic test that will determine which maintenance treatment will be given on completion of your initial treatment. This will be in the form of an infusion or a tablet and is a targeted therapy that will help to prevent the cancer from coming back.