Breast Cancer And Treatment
Recent advances is medical science have produced an explosion of life-saving treatment options to combat breast cancer, bringing hope and relief to the thousands who suffer from the disease. Modern techniques recognize that not all breast cancers are the same and today there is a great variety of breast cancer treatment options that are designed to battle specific types of cancers. The choices — surgery, radiation, anti-estrogen therapy, and/or chemotherapy — can be overwhelming and making your ultimate decision can be a daunting task that will take a lot of patience and research.
After you have been diagnosed, your doctor will plan your treatment based on your pathology report and medical history. You should make sure that you are involved at this stage and ask as many questions as you can to inform and educate yourself about your condition and your treatment options. Feel free to do your own research and show your results to the doctor. Your treatment plan will consist of one or more treatments specifically designed to target cancer cells in various ways and to reduce the risk of recurrence.
Read on for a brief overview of some of the most common breast cancer treatments.
Surgery:
Surgery is generally the first attack against breast cancer. Although any kind of surgery involves a certain degree of risk, the technology available today for breast cancer surgery has come a long way. Deciding on the appropriate type of surgery depends on the stage and nature of your cancer as well as your own medical condition and history. In some cases, patients have the opportunity to choose between two types of surgery – mastectomy and lumpectomy followed by radiation. The former involves the complete removal of the breast, whereas the latter is a breast-conserving surgery.
Chemotherapy:
The main purpose of chemotherapy is to eliminate the cancer cells that may have spread from the infected area to elsewhere in your body. The therapy is used to target cells that divide rapidly. However, the cancer cells are not the only cells in your body that divide rapidly. There are also cells in your mouth, blood, nails, nose, hair and vagina that undergo rapid division. This means that chemotherapy is likely to have a side effect on those areas as well. However, it must be said that chemotherapy is a lot easier to tolerate now than it was a few years ago. Most women feel that it is the most important step in reducing the chance of cancer recurrence. It should also be noted that organs such as the liver and kidneys are rarely affected by chemotherapy.
Radiation Therapy
Radiation therapy, or radiotherapy, is a very effective technique to destroy cancer cells that might be lingering in the breast even after surgery. Radiation therapy has been shown to reduce the risk of cancer recurrence by up to 70 percent. Contrary to what many believe, radiotherapy is relatively easy to undergo and has limited side effects.
There are also a number of targeted therapy techniques such as Herceptin, Tykerb, Avastin and others, that are designed to be uncompromising on the cancer cells and yet have little or limited side effects on other areas of the body. These techniques can be either alternatives to the above methods or they can be complementary.
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