Pancreatic cancer can occur in any part of pancreas commonest being peri ampullary (where pancreatic duct and bile duct open in duodenum) followed with head pancreas.

Cancer in tail of pancreas is not very common and tends to get detected late. Peri ampullary cancer get detected early because of development of jaundice due to blockage of bile duct, these cancers have the best outcome.

Head pancreases get detected late and quite often are detected when major blood vessels like portal vein or inferior vena cava get involved and the tumor becomes in - operable.

They usually get detected when patient gets backache. Tumor in head pancreas lying close to common bile duct can cause jaundice due to compression of bile duct.

In pancreatic cancer a blood tumor marker called ca. 19-9 gets raised.

Curative treatment for pancreatic cancer is surgery. In peri ampullary and head pancreatic tumor the surgery to be done is whipple pancreatic duodenectomy where head of pancreas alogn with duodenum and often part of stomach is removed and multiple new by passes are done for flow of bile into intestine and food passage.