Chemotherapy consists of using drugs to combat cancer. With the increasing sophistication of pharmacology, those drugs are safer, more effective and more targeted, with fewer side effects than ones of the past. Today, it's common to use a drug 'cocktail' in order to offset side effects and provide a more effective treatment.

The drugs used typically interfere with the cells' ability to divide, since that is one of the chief characteristics of cancers, an uncontrolled growth from abnormal cell division in breast cancer tissue.

Chemotherapy is often chosen when the cancer has become more advanced, requiring more a rigorous response to eradicate cancer cells. Cancer cells clumps can grow and metastasize (spread of a primary tumor to other areas, forming secondary tumors of similar type). That condition may indicate that chemotherapy is an appropriate regimen.

Cancers can reappear. The causes of recurrence are not completely understood. In some cases it is possible that the original cancer wasn't completely gotten rid of. It is also possible that the true problem that originally caused the cancerous tumor is active and still present within the body, thus causing the cancer to rear its ugly head. Whatever the reason may, physicians typically use chemotherapy.

One of the most noted complications that comes with chemotherapy is the side effects. Even through drugs used in cancer treatments are beginning to improve, chemotherapy treatments can often affect a person's healthy cells and not just the ones that are cancerous.

Radiation also has its own negatives. Radiation compromises an individual's immune system, which is needed to help to fight cancer.

The digestive system is often affected in negative ways, leading to nausea, common among those undergoing chemotherapy treatments. Hair loss is a by-now familiar effect. But chemotherapy can even affect the composition of bone marrow, which leads to a number of harmful effects. Bone marrow performs several functions in the body. Foremost among them is aiding in the production of red and white blood cells.

Damage to heart, kidney and other organs is possible, though this is uncommon since cells in these organs don't divide as frequently under natural circumstances. In some studies, memory and concentration loss were associated with chemotherapy treatments. Older female patients often find the reproductive cycle altered, bringing on premature menopause. 'Female patients' is specified here since men, too, can contract breast cancer.

Still, drugs in use today are better tolerated and more targeted that those of previous generations. They may help cut off vessels that supply blood to the tumors which encourage the growth of just such vessels to feed themselves. There are a variety of chemotherapy regimens, with each one designed for the individual patient and his or her circumstances.

Even though it is not a pleasant experience chemotherapy offers people the chance to fight agains a disease that was once always fatal. Today cancer is a disease that can be survived long term with very few long term side effects. All of this is courtesy of chemotherapy.