If your sarcoma does come back, it’s important to get treated as quickly as possible. 

Sometimes, sarcoma can come back to the same area after treatment for a previous tumour. This is called a recurrence. It might also come back to another area of the body. This is called metastasis.

Follow-up care  

Follow-up care is also known as surveillance. This care is important and begins when you have completed your cancer treatment. You’ll have these appointments with your clinical team, including your sarcoma nurse specialist.  

They use follow up as a way of looking to see if your sarcoma has come back, either in the place it was originally removed from (recurrence), or in another part of your body (metastasis).  

Your follow-ups after having sarcoma will depend on the grade of the tumour you had and the treatments you had. The grade tells you how likely the cancer is to spread. Follow-up can last for many years and will depend on the type of sarcoma you had.  

Your follow-up should include:

• reviewing any new symptoms  
• examining areas for local recurrence 
• chest X-rays to check for cancer spreading to the lungs 
• monitoring of late side effects from treatment. 

Depending on the type of sarcoma you had, you might also have MRI scans or ultrasound scans. Follow-up care is also a good opportunity to ask any questions you might have.  

Scanxiety 

For some people with sarcoma, having regular scans can trigger anxiety. This is sometimes known as ‘scanxiety’. It’s important to know that this is completely normal.  

The cancer charity Maggie’s have support for managing scanxiety.

Self-examination 

In between follow-up appointments, or after you’ve finished follow-up, it’s important to check for recurrences yourself through self-examination. This means checking yourself for sarcoma coming back.  

Your doctor or sarcoma clinical nurse specialist can tell you what to look for. If it comes back, you might have: 

• new lumps or pain in the area where the sarcoma was removed 
• new lumps in other areas of your body  
• a cough that doesn’t go away.  

If you are worried, or if you have any symptoms, contact your sarcoma specialist team. They may decide to bring forward the date of your follow-up appointment to look into your concerns. 

Metastasis 

If sarcoma does come back, it might have metastasised. This means it might have spread to another part of the body. This is sometimes called secondary cancer.  

In some cases, people can be diagnosed with sarcoma because their metastases have been discovered before their primary sarcoma tumour.  

These secondary cancers most commonly appear in the lungs, which is why you will have a chest X-ray at follow-up appointments. They may also appear in the liver or brain. If your sarcoma spreads to another area of the body, it will still be treated as a sarcoma.