about breast cancer?

Question

my aunt is 52 years old.She was diagnosed of infiltrating ductal carcinoma ,moderately differentiated with tumor size of 2.8 to 2.5 to2.4 cm.axillary lymph node staus was five lymph node positvie out of 22.cancer stage was 2nd .She performed surgery 12 days ago .But now she is unwilling to take chemo and radiation therapy.She fears she will die if she undergoes those treatments.I WANT TO KNOW HOW SERIOUS IS HER CASE.What are the chances of survial or prognosis if she does chemo.What are the side effects of chemo.help me please. she is very much depressed now.also where can i find relevant informations in net.

i want to know how good is the prognosis .

Answer 1

Sorry to hear about your aunt. Her oncologist will be able to tell her her prognosis, but remember a prognosis is just a prediction, not a guarantee of an individual outcome. Her oncologist can also tell her by what percentage her survival rate is likely to improve if she has chemo.

I was diagnosed in December 2003 with grade 3 stage 3 breast cancer; my tumour was 2.5 cm, and 13 of 21 lymph nodes were involved, so a fairly poor prognosis. I was 50 at diagnosis, the same sort of age as your aunt.

I can certainly understand her reluctance to have chemotherapy; I felt the same; but in the end I went ahead. Chemo will NOT kill your aunt, nor will radiotherapy. They are recommended because they extend many, many lives. In 2 months it will be four years since my diagnosis, and so far I am fit and well, with no evidence of cancer.

Side effects of chemo vary from person to person. My main side effects were nausea, fatigue and depression. I never actually vomited, as anti-sickness drugs are very effective these days and will be changed or adjusted if the patient is vomiting. Constipation is an unpleasant side effect in the days after each chemo. Many chemo regimes cause hair loss; it isn't pleasant but it grows back quickly. Weight gain is a possibility because of the steroids given to combat nausea; my appetite was huge.

For me and for many others the side effects were worst for up to a week after each chemo; then although I felt tired I felt much less nauseous and almost normal (chemo is usually every three weeks).

It is of course your aunt's choice whether to go for chemo or not; but please assure her it won't kill her, and if it has been recommended it is because it will possibly save or extend her life.

If I can be of any further help to you or your aunt, please email me.

My best wishes to you both.

Answer 2

Your Aunt's case IS serious. She has Stage 2 invasive cancer. The reason they want to do chemo is because they found it in her lymph nodes. I was diagnosed with Stage one in May(a month before I turned 53). I had a lumpectomy on June 1st. My tumor was 1.5 cm and insitu(non-invasive)my lymph nodes were clear. I went through 33 days of radiation, NO chemo. The radiation was a piece of cake(a little swelling, redness and itching, nothing most women can't handle :-) I have friends who have and are, undergoing chemo. LO_MCG gives a pretty good picture of what they are dealing with. Their cancers were, like your Aunt's, invasive and in the nodes. Chemo is a big decision for some of us(it would have been for me, had I needed it). My biggest worry, as might be your Aunt's, is that Chemo kills, not only the bad cells, it kills EVERYTHING in your body. Including the healthy cells. The immune system will never be the same. See if your Aunt will schedule another appointment with her oncologist and you go with her. Ask the oncologist to plug in the numbers and see what her percentages of reccurance are, with and without the treatments. Do the homework/research for her. You have made a good start by asking this question. A lot of us out here are more than willing to share our stories:-) One thing I found out, from the start, you must be pro-active in your treatment! Your Aunt has to feel good about her decisions. If she is depressed, she's not at ease with this whole thing. Suggest(or have her Doctor suggest)some counseling. It can do a lot of good, in some cases. October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month...

Answer 3

Do you know if they got all the cancer??? has it spread anywhere else? Have they recommend to do chemo? To me her out look is good but i am no doctor!! I guess she needs to weigh up what is important and maybe start thinking she will die if she DOESNT have treatment not the other way around?? if that is what the doc recommends. My mum was diagnosed in May this year with kidney cancer by the time it was discovered it had spread to her liver and lung. There was no cure no treatment nothing. She past away two weeks ago. Mum didnt get any chances, your aunt can definately bet this all odds are in her favour. Chemo is not pleasant it can make the patient sicker than the actual cancer itself. They become very tired, nausea, and dont eat much depending on the strength of the chemo.

Answer 4

I understand her depression, but I don't think she would want to pick no treatment with what is going on. The treatment (especially chemo) can make you feel pretty bad, but it is while you are going through treatment, and, eventually you feel okay again. I'm on my second bout with breast cancer and I'm not sure what is going to happen. What I do understand is that there are more options than when I had it the first time in 2000. She may want to joint a support group in her area where other women are also dealing with it. It helps not to feel alone.

Answer 5

You would have to talk to the oncologist about her odds. I don't understand why she refuses to take chemo and radiation. If shes done the surgery, why not do the rest. My cancer was infiltrating ducal carcinoma in its 3rd stage with 9 lymph nodes positive. Chemo effects every person differently. My experience was hair lose and nausea along with lactose intolerance, bone pain, tire easly food doesn't taste good. Radiation for me was a breeze I didn't start to burn until my last couple of treatments. If your aunt wants to fight this cancer she should do everything that her oncologist tells her to do.

Answer 6

Infiltrating Ductal Carcinoma is not a serious case... heres my findings: Ductal carcinoma is a very common type of breast cancer in women. It comes in two forms: infiltrating ductal carcinoma (IDC), an invasive cell type; and ductal carcinoma in situ (DCIS), a noninvasive cancer. DCIS is the most common type of noninvasive breast cancer in women. Ductal carcinoma refers to the development of cancer cells within the milk ducts of the breast. In situ means "in place" and refers to the fact that the cancer has not moved out of the duct and into any surrounding tissue.

As screening mammography has become more widespread, DCIS has become one of the most commonly diagnosed breast conditions. It is often referred to as "stage zero breast cancer." In countries where screening mammography is uncommon, DCIS is sometimes diagnosed at a later stage, but in countries where screening mammography is widespread, it is usually diagnosed on a mammogram when it is so small that it has not formed a lump. DCIS is not painful or dangerous, and it does not metastasize unless it first develops into invasive cancer.

DCIS is usually discovered through a mammogram as very small specks of calcium known as microcalcifications. However, not all microcalcifications indicate the presence of DCIS, which must be confirmed by biopsy. DCIS may be multifocal, and treatment is aimed at excising all of the abnormal duct elements, leaving "clear margins", an area of much debate. After excision treatment often includes local radiation therapy. With appropriate treatment, DCIS is unlikely to develop into invasive cancer. Surgical excision with radiation lowers the risk that the DCIS will recur or that invasive breast cancer will develop.


Check out this websites for information

http://health.yahoo.com/topic/breastcancer/overview/article/healthwise/tv3617

http://www.breastcancer.org/ (notes check out the reports on the left side for chemo and radiation)

Answer 7

Any treatments will only make her better and increase her life expectancy.
You can find more information on breast cancer treatments here: http://cancerhelp.awardspace.com/

Hope it helps, My best regards.

Answer 8

We don't know the cause. If we did, we might be able to prevent it and treat it better. Symptoms are rare. I had a red rash present from the tumor causing tissue changes. The lump was rather large but my doc never detected it. No worries though; it's very treatable, fine now.

Answer 9

I have an aunt who just recently turned 80 years old but was a breast cancer patient in the 1960's and in the 1980's. She did not undergo any chemotherapy after her surgery procedures (lateral mastectomy) then. My wife's aunt and a first cousin both died of breast cancer at the young age of 45 years old. They both underwent radiation and chemotherapy treatments after their lateral mastectomy procedures. My father at 84 years of age was afflicted with squamous cell carcinoma in the urinary bladder and underwent both intravenous (IV) chemotherapy and Linear Acceleration (radiation) therapies, beginning December 2004 after a trans urethral resection of bladder tumor (TURBT) in November 2004. By April 2006, he expired. The year 2005 meant 3 more cystoscopies (TURBT's) and several more hospital confinements (IV antibiotic drips) that saw him deteriorate from a straight and tall brisk-walking individual to a frail and unable to get up without assitance skeleton by January 2006. Anecdotal accounts and my own personal experience as the ambulance driver for my father. I myself underwent surgery at 55 years of age, for stage 2 high-grade transitional cell carcinoma in the urinary bladder losing my u.bladder my prostate and sealing my urethra. The beauty is 7 of the 7 lymph nodes taken out came back "negative for tumor cells." I now use a urostomy appliance (external artificial bladder) and consider myself "sexually disabled." :)

I did a GOOGLE Search: "Breast Cancer: Alternative medicine," which yielded 3,840,000 websites!!! Why did I go "alternative medicine?" Because your statement, "she fears she will die if she undergoes those (chemotherapy and radiation) treatments."

Also, using your information: 2nd stage breast cancer; 5 lymph nodes positive for tumor cells out of 22 (5/22 = 22.73%); your aunt, at 52 years old has an excellent chance of recovering fully provided she receives a treatment that best suits her constitution and her current state of health.

Talk to an ONCOLOGIST, or several of them... Then, talk to an ALTERNATIVE MEDICINE practitioner, or many of them. The former will push chemotherapy and radiation and the latter will approach it holistically, meaning, physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual. The latter will focus on the IMMUNE SYSTEM of your aunt and will recommend ways and means to strengthen it before even proposing a particular treatment. Why? Because after the surgery, your aunt needs to recover before subjecting herself to further treatment.

Take heart, cancer is not a death sentence. Truth to tell, there is a cure. Allopathic (western medicine) treatments boast about treatments that end up in remission. Alternative medicine proposes CURES! The choice is your aunt's and yours.

Finally, pray that you may be enlightened on the "best" path to take. The DIVINE HEALER is always there to listen and act according to your faith (belief). May HE help your aunt and you choose the best approach so that she can recover and live a long and full life. Take care and God bless.