Things to Know About Stage IV Cancer
Stage IV cancers have spread (metastasized) to other organs or throughout the entire body. Metastasis occurs when cancer cells move from its primary location and remotely establish themselves in another location. The steps of metastasis are malignant transformation, tumor vascularization, blood vessel penetration, and arrest and invasion. The three routes of spread are local seeding, blood borne routing (sarcomas), and lymphatic routing (carcinomas).
