Breast cancer - the verdict?

Breast cancer - a cancer that develops in the cells of the breast. There are different types of this disease, but the most common cancer begins to grow in the milk ducts (ductal carcinoma).

Breast cancer can develop in both women and men, but is much more common in women. Recently, thanks to the enhanced awareness of women related to breast cancer risk, the number of deaths due to this disease has been declining quite rapidly. However, much remains to be done to ensure that women have started to be more aware of the danger of this disease and in time seek medical help.

Symptoms of breast cancer:

• Seal, nodules in the breast that can be felt with your fingers
• Bloody discharge from the nipple
• Change the size or shape of the breast
• Change the breast skin - for example, the appearance of spots or depressions
• Inverted nipples
• Marked exfoliation of skin on the breasts and / or nipples
• "Orange peel" on the chest

Despite the fact that in most cases these symptoms indicate benign changes when they occur you need to see a doctor immediately. Even if you recently did a mammogram and it showed normal results, you need to be screened at the slightest suspicion of breast cancer.

Causes

What exactly is the cause of breast cancer, like other cancers, is still unknown. However, we know that breast cancer develops when abnormal cell growth in breast tissue. The cells with abnormal changes in healthy cells divide rapidly and they are living longer. In large quantities, these cells form a tumor that has spread to all the tissues of the breast, lymph nodes, and on different parts of the body - a process called metastasis, and at this stage is almost impossible to cure cancer.

According to doctors 5-10% of cases of breast cancer associated with gene features that are passed from parents to children. It allocates some defective genes that increase the risk of developing breast cancer. The most common BRCA1 gene and the gene BRCA2. Both of these genes are associated with increased risk of breast cancer and ovarian cancer.

Diagnostics

Medical checkup. First, the physician, having heard the patient, spends breast examination, including - palpation to detect seals and other possible anomalies in breast tissue. Probably, the doctor will conduct a palpation in different positions - for example, when you are standing, lying on the side, and keep your hands raised.

Mammography - X-rays of the breast it. Mammography is often carried out in the course of a routine check women for breast cancer Breast cancer: what every woman needs to know . If it is detected any abnormality, the doctor may recommend to undergo additional diagnostic procedures.

Ultrasound examination of the breast. With ultrasound you can get a picture of structures deep within the body. Usually, ultrasound is used to determine the nature of the tumors in the mammary gland, in particular that there is liquid inside them, or they are completely composed of a dense tissue (such seals may be both cancerous and benign). In addition, ultrasound can be useful in biopsy - it allows you to perform sampling tissue therefrom, where necessary.

Biopsy - a fragment of tissue sampling for laboratory analysis to determine whether the cells are cancerous tissue or not. by biopsy and determine the type of the cells forming cancerous tumor, the aggressiveness of the cancer and the presence or absence of cancer cells hormone receptors.

Magnetic resonance imaging of the chest. Apparatus for MRI uses radio waves to image the different tissues of the body. Before breast MRI patient injected with a contrast agent to accurately evaluate the size and shape of the tumor. MRI performed after breast cancer has been confirmed by biopsy, and prior to surgery. This procedure gives the doctor even an idea of ​​exactly where the tumor is located and how large it is, and in some cases helps to identify the tumor in the other breast.

Determining the stage of cancer

After a diagnosis of breast cancer doctor is necessary to determine the stage of cancer. On this basis, you can predict and select the most appropriate method of treatment. Sometimes, the final conclusion of the stage can not be done prior to surgery.

Typically, to determine the stage of cancer, the following diagnostic procedures:

• Blood test;
• Mammography other breast for signs of cancer spread;
• X-ray of the breast;
• MRI;
• Bone scan;
• Computed tomography;
• Positron emission tomography.

The doctor chooses the most appropriate diagnostic methods, based on the characteristics of each individual case. There are five stages of breast cancer Breast cancer - stage cancer   - From 0 to IV. Zero stage - a very small, non-invasive tumors. Stage IV - is metastatic breast cancer that has spread to other parts of the body.

Risk factors

The following risk factors theoretically increase the risk of developing breast cancer patients to which these factors apply. However, the degree of their influence on the development of the disease has not been established. It is known, people with multiple risk factors do not always fall ill with breast cancer and are sick, those who have risk factors with little or absent.

• Paul. Women fall ill with breast cancer much more often than men.
• Age. The risk of breast cancer increases with age. Most of all it affects women older than 55 years.
• Breast cancer history. If you had a cancer in one breast education, there is a fairly high probability that after a while it starts to develop in the other.
• Breast cancer is a family history. If breast cancer or suffer hurt your close relatives, you are at risk for the disease. However, the majority of breast cancer patients with a family history of this disease is not.
• Exposure to radiation. At risk are people who ever passed radiotherapy and / or exposed to radiation in other conditions.
• Obesity. The body obese women, produces more estrogen than women of normal weight. This hormone can be a trigger of some types of breast cancer.
• Early onset of menstruation. Those periods began at the age of 12, are at risk.
• Later onset of pause. Women who had menopause after age 55 are also at risk.
• Later, the birth of the first child. The birth of the first child over the age of 35 years increases the risk of breast cancer in women.
• Hormone replacement therapy after menopause. The use of drugs with estrogen Estrogen - the key to bone health   and progesterone to treat symptoms of menopause is also associated with an increased risk of developing breast cancer.
• Alcohol abuse increases the likelihood of breast cancer. Scientists can not explain why it happens.

Surgery

• Removal of the cancerous tumor. During this operation, the surgeon removes the tumor and a small amount of surrounding healthy tissue. This operation is prescribed to patients who have found small tumors that are easily separated from the surrounding tissue. This is the only operation that allows you to almost completely maintain the chest in which there was a malignant tumor.
• Removal of the breast (mastectomy). Normal mastectomy involves removal of all breast tissue, including adipose tissue, shares zhezhdolkovyh channels of the skin, nipple and areola. When radical mastectomy in addition, removed the muscle beneath the breast and the lymph nodes in the armpit are falling. Today, radical mastectomy do less and less. In some cases it is possible to spend a mastectomy, breast preserving the skin, which may facilitate the reconstruction after surgery.
• Removing one lymph node (biopsy "sentry" lymph node). Breast cancer that has spread to the lymph nodes, may eventually spread to other areas of the body. The first lymph node Lymph nodes - what keeps our immune system In which cancer cells were tumor, lymph node called Time. The surgeon determines which lymph node located in the vicinity of the breast, lymph is of a cancerous tumor and removes it, and then to analyze for the presence of cancer cells. If they are not detected, the likelihood that they are in other lymph nodes is very small, and the removal of other nodes are not required.
• Deleting multiple lymph nodes (removal of axillary (underarm) lymph nodes. If the lymph node time was found cancer cells, it is recommended removal of other axillary lymph nodes. However, there is evidence indicating that the removal of the affected nodes are not improve survival among patients with early stage cancer, undergoing surgical removal of cancerous tumors, as well as among those undergoing chemotherapy or radiation therapy to treat tumors smaller than 5 cm (with the proviso that the cancer has spread only several axillary lymph nodes). In such cases, chemotherapy and radiotherapy after tumor removal is as effective . Furthermore, it avoids the serious side effects including chronic swelling of hands (lymphedema) that are often a consequence of the removal of axillary lymph nodes.

However, such an operation may be required if the cancer cells are found in lymph node time women who have had a mastectomy, after the removal of a large tumor, or if axillary lymph nodes are so great that they can find during palpation.

Complications of surgical treatment of breast cancer depends on the specific operation. However, it should be borne in mind that any operations related to the risk of bleeding and infection.

Talk to your doctor about the possibility of breast reconstruction after surgery; He may refer you to a plastic surgeon with extensive experience of working with patients who were treated for breast cancer. Sometimes, breast reconstruction is carried out simultaneously with mastectomy, sometimes - some time after the operation.