Breast Cancer: Treatment
Breast Cancer
Treatment
The vast majority of women now survive breast cancer. In this section, you'll find some of the leading breast cancer doctors in the world talking you through the options for the earlier stages of breast cancer.
Treatment: Choosing Your Treatment
Treatment: Early Stages
The treatment route your doctor will take for your breast cancer will depend on many factors, like your history and the cancer’s stage. Below, you will find information on the various treatments available for all stages of breast cancer.
Treatment: Hormone Treatments
HER2-Positive Breast Cancer
Women who are diagnosed with HER2-positive breast cancer have high levels of the HER2 protein on the outside of their cancer cells. For patients with early-stage disease, meaning they have relatively small tumors and no lymph involvement, a number of HER2-directed therapies have dramatically changed the landscape. These include drugs like Herceptin and Perjeta. According to Dr. Elizabeth Comen, a... Read More
A mastectomy involves removing the breast – a treatment route many patients with breast cancer feel they will have no choice but to undergo. But it’s not the only surgical option.
Treatment: Surgery
A mastectomy involves removing the breast – a treatment route many patients with breast cancer feel they will have no choice but to undergo. But it’s not the only surgical option.
Do I Need Genetic Sequencing?
Genetic sequencing of tumors has become standard practice, according to many experts. The test allows doctors to understand some of the changes or mutations that may have evolved in a tumor. Your doctor can decide whether you are a candidate for an approved drug that targets these mutations or could enter a clinical trial where you would get new drugs that are being tested. Gene sequencing, which... Read More
Treatment: Explaining the Options
For patients who do have to have their breasts or a piece of their breasts removed, there are a number of surgical reconstruction options available.
Treatment: Reconstruction
For patients who do have to have their breasts or a piece of their breasts removed, there are a number of surgical reconstruction options available.
Young Women & Breast Cancer
There are about 11,000 women aged 40 and under diagnosed with breast cancer every year in the U.S. says Dr Ann Partridge, an oncologist at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute in Boston. That's a small percentage of the 260,000 women diagnosed annually in this country. But in some ways a diagnosis for a younger woman can often be even more devastating because, as Dr Partridge says, the cancer is likel... Read More
Lymphedema is a chronic swelling that can occur after breast cancer surgery and radiation.
Treatment: Lymphedema
Lymphedema is a chronic swelling that can occur after breast cancer surgery and radiation.