About Our Care at The John A. DeQuattro Community Cancer Center
Caring for people with cancer requires the highest quality medical services – and so much more. It was a desire to provide complete cancer care services to support people both physically and emotionally that led to the opening of The John A. DeQuattro Community Cancer Center on the campus of Manchester Memorial Hospital.
A unique alliance of hospitals – Manchester Memorial, Rockville General, Hartford and Johnson Memorial – formed a nonprofit partnership called Community CancerCare, which has also led to the creation of the Phoenix Community Cancer Center in Enfield.
The driving force behind the creation of Community CancerCare was to provide radiation therapy for residents east of the Connecticut River. Two of the major treatment options for cancer – chemotherapy and surgery – had been available locally for years. But cancer patients who needed radiation therapy had to travel outside the area for treatment.
Visit the Community CancerCare website for more information.
Understanding Cancer
Cancer is not an outside force that invades the body, such as a virus or bacteria. It is the result of a deadly change within the body’s own cells. In a strange twist of fate, these renegade cells declare war on the very host that created them.
Cancer is actually a group of many related diseases. All forms of cancer involve the out-of-control growth and spread of abnormal cells. Cancer can occur almost anywhere in the body — in the bones, muscles, blood, skin, brain and other organs.
Normal cells grow, divide and die in an orderly fashion. But a cancer cell is a cell that has gone astray. Its genetic material becomes altered, and it grows and divides into other cancerous cells, pushing healthy cells out of its path. The body cannot control the growth of these rebel cells, and they take on their own purpose and direction.
Once started, cancer can grow around and through neighboring organs and tissues, blocking blood vessels and crowding other organs out of position. It can spread in another way, too, when cancerous cells break away from the original growth. These cells can travel through the bloodstream or the lymphatic system to other areas in the body. Once they find a place where they can attach, they can start to divide again, and a new cancerous growth is formed. If it is not stopped by treatment, cancer can kill.
At The John A. DeQuattro Community Cancer Center, our mission is to provide this life-saving treatment in a comfortable and caring environment.