Is Blood Cancer Curable? Exploring Treatment Options and Outlook

oncare team
Updated on Apr 17, 2025 16:38 IST

By Raveena M Prakash

Blood cancer is a life-threatening disease that affects the production of blood and how blood cells work. The majority of cancer starts from bone marrow, and your bone marrow is a soft, sponge-like material found in the center of your bones, where the blood cells are produced. Blood cancer is also known as hematologic cancer. If you are worried about the cure for blood cancer, then read further; this blog is for you!


If you or any loved ones are diagnosed with blood cancer, and you are concerned about whether blood cancer is curable or not, then read further. 

In this article, we’ll explore the types of blood cancer, causes and symptoms, risk factors, treatment, and prevention!

What is blood cancer?

Blood cancer is a deadly cancer that affects the blood cells and the bone marrow. This type of cancer, also known as hematologic cancer, happens when the abnormal blood cells grow out of control and start to disrupt the functions of healthy blood cells, which often helps to fight against infection and produce new healthy blood cells.

Types of blood cancer

There are mainly three types of blood cancer found in people, and each type of cancer has several subtypes as well.


Leukemia:

This is the most common type of cancer affecting blood. Leukemia is a common type of blood cancer where the cancer affects the white blood cells. It happens when the body produces a large amount of white blood cells and this starts to interfere with the patient’s bone marrow and its ability to produce blood cells, and platelets. 

There are different types of leukemias: Acute lymphoblastic leukemia, Acute myeloid leukemia, chronic lymphoblastic leukemia and chronic myelogenous leukemia.


Lymphoma:

This is another type of cancer that affects the lymph system, which includes your bone marrow. The lymphatic system includes various lymph nodes. Lymph nodes are found throughout the body. When a patient is diagnosed with lymphoma, their healthy cells in the lymphatic system start to change and grow out of control. There are different types of lymphoma found in patients. These may include: Hodgkin lymphoma, non-Hodgkin lymphoma, Waldenstrom macroglobulinemia, follicular lymphoma, B-cell lymphoma and cutaneous T-cell lymphoma.

Myeloma:

This is another type of cancer developed in the bone marrow and affects your plasma cells. Multiple myeloma is the most common type of myeloma found in patients. There are other types of myeloma there: Plasmacytoma and amyloidosis.

What Causes Blood Cancer?

Many studies suggest that, Blood or Hematologic cancer happens when the blood cells DNA changes or starts to mutate, but the reason why cancer happens is not cleared yet. The major causes of blood or Hematologic cancer is caused by the mutations in the genetic material mainly in the DNA of blood cells.

Risk factors

There are some risk factors that cause the chances of developing hematologic cancer in people. 


These risk factors may include:


  • Age
  • Family history of cancer
  • Excessive exposure to chemicals and radiation
  • Weak immune system
  • Genetic disorders

Symptoms of Blood cancer

The symptoms often vary based on the type of cancer. However, there are several symptoms of cancer in the blood that are common in three types of hematologic cancers. 


These may include:


  • Fatigue: Experiencing tiredness and weakness, and you fail to manage your daily activities. 
  • Continuous fever: Fever is often associated as a sign of your body fighting against the infection or responding to abnormal cancer cells. 
  • Experiencing night sweats: You start sweating while sleeping, and excessive sweating makes your clothes and bedsheets get soaked in sweat.
  • Unusual bruising or bleeding: If you notice any unusual bleeding or bruising that won’t stop and doesn’t heal even after two weeks. 
  • Sudden weight loss: An unexpected weight loss of 5 kg or 10 pounds over a 12-months period is often considered as unexplained weight loss. 
  • Frequent infections: Getting continuous infections might be a sign of something affecting your immune system.
  • Swollen lymph nodes and enlarged liver or spleen: If you are facing any of these signs, these conditions might indicate leukemia or lymphoma. 
  • Experiencing bone pain: Types of myeloma and leukemia often cause the symptoms of bone pain or tender spots on your bones.

Diagnosis and Tests

There are several tests, and imaging tests are used to diagnose cancer in suspected patients. If you have any symptoms, then your healthcare provider might perform some tests to confirm the cancer.


Tests used to diagnose cancer include:


  • CBC Test: In this test, it checks your complete count of your blood cells. If you have any symptoms of leukemia, then your doctor might check the counts of white blood cells, lower than normal blood cells, along with platelet cells.
  • Blood chemistry test: In this test, the doctor checks the presence of chemicals or substances in your blood.
  • CT Scan: This test used to check a series of X ray images of patients' soft tissues and bones. If you have any symptoms of myeloma, your doctor might perform a CT Scan to check any damage in your bones.
  • MRI Scan: These scans are used to check if any signs of leukemia or lymphoma affected the spine of a suspected patient.
  • Bone marrow biopsies: These tests are used to check the percentage of normal or abnormal blood cells in your bone marrow.

Is blood cancer curable?

Blood cancer is not curable in most cases, but in many cases it can be cured because of the advancements in cancer treatments. There are different treatments available today that can increase the quality of life and life expectancy of a patient. Remission is one of the methods used to eliminate the symptoms for a long time, further resulting in extending the patient’s life expectancy and improving the overall quality of life.

However, the potential for curing blood cancer mainly depends on several factors, including the type of cancer, the stage of diagnosis, the patient’s age, the overall health of a patient, and how well their body responds to the treatment.

Treatments mainly depend upon several factors. Your oncologist might decide your treatment plan based on the type of cancer and its stage, your age, overall health, whether the cancer has spread into other parts of the body or not, including the central nervous system, and the treatment's side effects.

Some common treatments may include:


Chemotherapy

Chemotherapy is often considered the primary treatment for people diagnosed with cancer in the blood. This treatment uses some specific medicines designed to destroy or kill cancer cells. These specific chemo drugs are harmful to the healthy cells in the body. However, this might make the patient feel hard on their body; when the healthy cells get damaged, it starts to show the side effects of chemotherapy. 

In some cases, blood cancer treatments are performed with a combination of treatments such as chemotherapy, radiation therapy, or stem cell transplantation.

Radiation therapy

In this treatment, intense X-rays or other types of radiation are given to the patient. These types of radiation are used to destroy cancer cells in the patient’s body. Radiation therapy is an integral part of cancer treatments, especially in blood. Radiation therapy is mostly combined with treatments such as chemotherapy and immunotherapy to reduce the symptoms of cancer and improve the overall quality of life.

The most common radiation therapy is known as external beam radiation therapy (EBRT). In this radiotherapy, the radiation is given outside of the body. There is another combined treatment known as radioimmunotherapy that is given to treat blood or hematologic cancer in patients.

Immunotherapy

Immunotherapy is another major treatment given to blood cancer, especially leukemia, lymphoma and multiple myeloma. Immunotherapy used to boost the immune systems of cancer patients to identify and destroy the cancer cells. 


Most cancer patients find immunotherapy therapy has short-term side effects when compared to other cancer treatments. There are several types of immunotherapy treatments used in cancer patients, especially in hematologic cancer.

Different types of immunotherapy are: 

  • T cell therapy 
  • Cytokine treatment
  • Donor lymphocyte infusion
  • Monoclonal antibody treatment  
  • Radioimmunotherapy. 

Targeted Therapy

This treatment is mostly performed to interfere with the growth and survival of cancer cells in the patient's body. Different types of cancers have different targets in a patient's body. In most cases, patients are advised to undergo tests to find out the genes, proteins, and other factors in their cancer cells. 

Targeted treatment is mostly given as a standalone treatment or sometimes combined with other treatments, such as chemotherapy. The majority of targeted therapy might include monoclonal antibodies, T cell therapy, or tyrosine kinase inhibitors (TKIs).

Cancer surgeries

Surgeries are performed on some types of cancer patients, especially in blood. These include lymphoma, especially those where the cancer starts in the spleen or other organs outside of the lymphatic system.

For example, for thyroid or stomach cancer, surgery might be used to perform in cancer that is confined to one area. 

CAR T-cell therapy

This treatment is mostly used to treat cancer such as B cell acute lymphoblastic leukemia, multiple myeloma, and other types of non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, if any other cancer treatment has worked on the patient. 


In this treatment, the patient’s T cells, a type of immune cell, are genetically modified in a lab to identify and destroy the cancer cells effectively and then injected into the patient’s cells to fight against the cancer.

Autologous Stem Cell transplant

In this treatment, healthy blood cells from the patient’s body are used to replace bone marrow that’s not working properly. An autologous stem cell transplant is also known as an autologous bone marrow transplant.

Allogeneic Stem Cell transplant

In this treatment, the doctor replaces the cancer patient’s diseased bone marrow with healthy bone marrow with healthy stem cells from a donor. This procedure is an effective yet dangerous treatment for the cure of cancer. 


Side effects of cancer treatments

Blood or Hematologic cancer treatments often come with a combination of treatments, such as chemotherapy and radiation therapy. Both of these treatments are effective, but they come with some side effects on the body. 

Here are some of the side effects of cancer treatments:

  • Immunotherapy side effects: Almost 50% of cancer patients with immunotherapy have experienced serious side effects such as skin rashes, fatigue, diarrhea, and a drop in their thyroid levels. 
  • Targeted therapy side effects: There are some common side effects, such as diarrhea, increased liver enzymes, and rashes. There are long-term side effects such as an increase in heart problems and stroke as well.

Prevention

Cancer develops when your blood cells DNA starts to change or mutate. The reason why blood cancer is developing in the blood cell is not clear yet. This makes it hard to find preventive measures or steps to reduce the risk of developing this type of cancer in people. 


Here are some factors that play a huge role in the genetic change of blood cells.

These may include: 


  • Extreme radiation or chemical exposure
  • Low immune system due to infections
  • Family history of cancer
  • Genetic disorders
  • Inherited conditions increase the chance of cancer

Consult Today

Blood cancer is a deadly disease mostly considered as not curable, but in many cases the condition is increasingly changing as, yes, it can be cured. With the advancement in cancer research and effective cancer treatments such as chemotherapy, radiation therapy, immunotherapy, and stem cell transplants, many patients can achieve remission, and in some cases, it can be curable. The key lies in early diagnosis, personalized treatments, and continuous cancer care. 

At Oncare Cancer Center, our dedicated team of experts offers specialized consultation and early cancer diagnosis, along with hope and healing for all cancer patients.

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