cancer
Symptoms of Cancer
Pain
Many cancers are typically painless at first, although pain may be an early symptom of some cancers, such as brain tumors that cause headache and head and neck and esophageal cancers that cause painful swallowing. As cancers grow, the first symptom is often a mild discomfort, which may steadily worsen into increasingly severe pain as the cancer enlarges. The pain may result from the cancer compressing or eroding into nerves or other structures. However, not all cancers cause severe pain. Similarly, lack of pain does not guarantee that a cancer is not growing or spreading. 