How can cancer spread if I had surgery to remove it?

How can cancer spread if I had surgery to remove it?

Christian Cable, Dr. Ryan Osborne & Dr. Noam Z. Drazin (Cancer Experts) gives expert video advice on: Is surgery always necessary to treat cancer?; Can all cancers be treated with surgery?; How can cancer spread if I had surgery to remove it?

There are times when you think that the cancer is very localized and you attempt to remove it surgically and when you are right, you will have cured that patient. But there will be times when you think it's localized and in actuality, a few of those cancer cells have made a way distally to spread on a microscopic level that cannot be detected at the time. You may still go ahead and and try to surgically remove that cancer. Unfortunately, that one or two cells that made its way before you did your operation to a distant part may actually survive and grow and be a recurrence on another side of the body. You may not have cured that patient. The problem is you don't really know which of those scenarios you are going to find when you go in at all times.