The Treatment of Breast Cancer

Your prognosis is your outlook or your chance of recovery from breast cancer. New and better treatments are helping people diagnosed with breast cancer live longer than ever before. Still, breast cancer may come back or spread to another part of the body after treatment. Your doctor will consider many factors when determining your prognosis, including, the size of the breast cancer the stage of the breast cancer: whether the cancer is only in the breast or has spread to the lymph nodes or other places in the body the type of breast cancer the hormone-receptor status of the cancer HER2 status whether the cancer is triple-negative estrogen-receptor-negative, progesterone-receptor-negative, and HER2-negative the rate of cell growth how likely the cancer is to come back recurrence whether the cancer has just been diagnosed or is a recurrence your age your menopausal status your general health. Doctors often use survival rates to talk about your prognosis. While some people want to know the statistics for others in similar situations, it’s important to remember that each person and each breast cancer is unique. Survival rates usually are based on the outcomes of many, many people diagnosed with breast cancer, but survival rates can’t predict what will happen in your particular situation.

The stage of your breast cancer is a very important factor based on decisions about your treatment options. The more the breast cancer spreads the more treatment you will need. But others can also be important such as if the cancer cells contain hormone receptors that is, if the cancer is ER-positive or PR-positive If the cancer cells have large amounts of the HER2 protien. If the cancer is positive Your health and personal preferences if you have gone through menopause or not , How fast the cancer is growing measured by grade. Talk with your doctor about how these factors can affect your treatment options.

Stage 0 cancer means that the cancer is limited to the inside of the milk duct and is a non-invasive cancer. The treatment approach for breast tumors are often different from the treatment of invasive breast cancer.

Stage one of these breast cancers are still very small and have not spread to the lymph nodes or have only a tiny area of cancer spread in the sentinel lymph node the first lymph node to which cancer is likely to spread.

Stage two these breast cancers are larger than stage one cancers and have spread to a few nearby lymph nodes.

Stage three these tumors are large or are growing into tissues in which the skin over the breast or the muscle under or they have spread and many turned into lymph nodes.

Stage four have spread beyond the breast and nearby lymph nodes to other parts of the body.

Treatment for stage IV breast cancer is usually a systemic drug therapy. Recurrence can be local in the same breast or in the surgery.

Treatment depends on where the cancer recurs and what treatments you have had before. Triple negative breast cancer cells don’t have estrogen or progesterone receptors and don’t have too much of the protein called HER2. Triple negative breast cancers grow and spread faster than most other types of breast cancer. The cancer cells don’t have hormone receptors, hormone therapy is not helpful in treating this cancer. They don’t have much HER2, drugs that target HER2 aren’t helpful, either. Chemotherapy is usually the standard treatment. There are not many current treatments for this type of breast cancer, if you are in otherwise good health, you might want to think about taking part in a Clinical trial testing a newer treatment.

Some common breast cancer signs and symptoms include Skin changes such as swelling, redness, or differences in one or both breasts that can be noticed. Females often notice the size or change in shape of the breasts. Changes in the look of one or both nipples, nipple discharge other than breast milk, some may experience pain or tenderness on any part of the breast. Others may feel Lumps on or inside of the breast. Symptoms more specific to breast cancer can be a rash break out or itchy breasts. Change in breast color can occur the breast may begin to look darker. Changes in touch it can feel hard, peeling or flaking of the nipple skin. Females often have the symptom of breast cancer as a lump or mass in the breast tissue. Women must go to their doctor after finding a lump, they should also be aware of any other changes to the breast or nipple that can be a sign of breast cancer. With the different type of cancers come a variety of related symptoms. A distinct breast lump that you can feel. A mammogram is an x-ray of the breast. People should make appointments to do screenings to detect breast cancer in women who have no apparent symptoms, diagnostic mammograms are used after suspicious results on a screening mammogram some sign alert the physician to check the tissue. A diagnostic mammogram can be determined if the symptoms are indicative of the presence of cancer. Diagnostic mammograms provide a more detailed x-ray of the breast using special techniques. They are also used in special circumstances, such as for patients with breast implants.”

The use of a mammogram is to be able to check for breast cancer it may depend on the size of the tumor. Mammography is less likely to show breast tumors in women younger than 50 years than in older women. This may be because younger women have denser breast tissue that appears white on a mammogram. When a tumor appears white on a mammogram it makes it harder to detect. If your doctor prescribes a diagnostic mammogram, realize that it will take longer than a normal screening because more x-rays are taken, providing views of the breast from multiple angles. The radiologist administering the test may also zoom in on a specific area of the breast where there is a suspicion of an abnormality. This should give your doctor a better image of the tissue to arrive at an accurate diagnosis.

Breast cancer is a type of cancer that starts in the tissue of the breast and spread to the surrounding area of the breast. This cancer begins from the inner lobules of the breast. They are called the ducts and is known as the part of the breast that makes milk. After a female develops cancer, she is tested to find out what type of cancer she has and which treatment would work better. In recent studies, the number of women getting breast cancer has increasing over the years. Women have one of the highest death rate due to breast cancer is higher than any other cancers. Breast Cancer Trends Among Women of early age In the U.S there is a one in eight that women will acquire a type of breast cancer in their lifetime. “Just in 2013 an estimated of 232,340 new cases of breast cancer was diagnosed in women all over the United States”.

Many researchers and doctors believe this is due to increase industrialization exposure, negative lifestyle choices and their family genetics.