Perhaps the best way to understand cancer is to think of cancer as an organ, just like other organs such as the lungs, kidneys, or liver. Although the cancer organ arises within other organs it does in fact have the complexity of other organs. Instead of simply thinking about cancer cells in isolation, by viewing cancer as an organ we can best dissect this complex entity and truly understand, diagnose, and manage it. We now better grasp that understanding the role of angio-genesis (formation of new blood vessels to feed the tumor), the presence of both cancer cells and cancer stem cells, the interaction of cancer cells and stromal elements, and the interaction of the immune system with all elements of the cancer organ is critical to understanding the complexity of cancer. In its most basic form, cancer is a failure in tissue homeosta-sis (cell growth vs. cell death).
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