Dry mouth is one of the side effects of cancer therapy. With cancer therapy, healthy tissues and cells are damaged, resulting in various complications. One such complication is dry mouth. Of course, certain complications depend on the part of the body affected by cancer. If there is tumor or cancer in the area of mouth or neck, dry mouth will be an inevitable side effect. Dry mouth is also a common side effect of anticancer drugs.
Common cancer therapy is performed in two different ways: radiation therapy and chemotherapy. Radiation therapy is the process of subjecting the affected cancer tissue to radiation. Although the radiation is emitted only on the affected parts of the body, radiation affecting other close parts of the body cannot be prevented, resulting in the dysfunction of some organs, glands, or tissues. Salivary glands are affected by radiation therapy, most commonly with throat and mouth cancer patients, or patients with low tumors of the brain.
With chemotherapy, there are particular drugs that are administered to patients. These drugs affect the sebaceous glands of the body including salivary glands. During or after the process of chemotherapy, there may be an enlargement in the salivary glands. This small inflammation of the glands affects the production of the saliva, reducing it and inevitably causing dry mouth. Although saliva production is not completely stopped due to chemotherapy, it is significantly reduced. Certain chemotherapy drugs are worse than others (for causing dry mouth) and some of the drugs affect saliva production differently depending on the size and frequency of the doses.
Some of the anticancer drugs causing dry mouth are following:
Accutane
Acrylin
Ala-cort
Alkeran
Amifostine
Arimidex
Azacitadine
Kidrolase
Lanacort
Lapnitib
Lenalidomide
Leustatin
Mercaptopurin
Mylocel
Octreotide
Oxaliplatin
Proleukin
Retinoic Acid
Streptoizocin
Toxal
Thioguanine
Vectibix
Xeloda
Zanosar
Zevalin
Zolina Zorneta
The FDA (Federal Drug Administration) regulation regulates all drugs in the United States and conducts clinical tests for side effects. Dry mouth is included as one of the side effects studied. Because of this, information on dry mouth is readily available. Clinical tests show that the taste buds and salivary glands are made of cells that are relatively more sensitive to chemotherapy drugs. This sensitivity makes dry mouth a common side effect of cancer treating agents and drugs.
