My mother got pleural effusion with 56 ounces of water and after 3 aspirations and a drainage tube coming out of that pleural space for 3 more days, total of 14 working on stopping this water retention, I m being told that the hospital does talc infusion. Doesn t talc cause cancer?! Seems like another bad thing to do oneself to stop another bad thing from happening. The question is, Won t this talc go systemic, or whatever, and cause cancer somewhere in the body? Mom is very old, so surgical they don t thing she s a candidate for that.