The Skagit Regional Health Cancer Care Center is a regional destination for lung cancer patients in Skagit, Island and north Snohomish counties. We provide an individualized lung cancer treatment plan that is coordinated by board-certified physicians across many disciplines. No matter what your lung cancer type or stage, we treat every patient on an individualized basis, using a highly personalized approach that allows us to provide the best possible lung cancer treatment or lung cancer cure. 

Lung cancer occurs if cells in the lung begin to divide and grow abnormally and out of control, creating a mass or tumor and crowding out normal cells. These malignant (cancerous) cells have lost the behavior of normal cells, which die when they are damaged and have “boundaries” keeping them from spreading to the tissue that surrounds them. If left untreated, lung cancer can spread to other sites in the body.

T he three main types of lung cancer include:

• Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer
• Small Cell Lung Cancer
• Lung Carcinoid Tumor (neuroendocrine tumor)

“Most of the time, lung cancer has no symptoms at all until the disease is very advanced,” said Thoracic Surgeon Richard Leone, MD, PhD, FACS. “CT scanning is the best way to identify early, treatable lung cancers. The newer CTs are amazingly good in finding tiny nodules.”  Low-dose CT screening, available at both Skagit Valley Hospital and Cascade Valley Hospital, is now covered by Medicare for high-risk patients ages 55 to 77. 

The National Comprehensive Cancer Network recommends that healthy adults at high risk for lung cancer talk to their primary care provider about screening with low-dose CT. 

For more information or for a referral for a low-dose CT screening, talk to your primary care provider.