Worries/Questions regarding Mastectomy
Hello, I wasn't sure which section to place my question in so I went with newly diagnosed (hope that was ok). I am 56 and was diagnosed with Stage 3 HER2+ and ER+ breast cancer in July 2019. I had a...
Forum Discussion
Breast cancer unfortunately is very resilient. The scans cannot show microscopic remaining cells and in reality only one needs to survive to reproduce. Once herceptin stops there is no protection from her2 and therefore if any remaining it can multiply extremely rapidly and go into stage 4 within months. Your life would then be looking at herceptin for as long as it works rather than it stopping at 12 months.
Removing the area the cancer was and nodes would reduce the risk of remaining cancer cells.
I too had same pathology but stage 1. I chose a bilateral and sentinel node biopsy. My cancer was difficult to detect via mammogram...actually it was not detected at all but found by myself 5 weeks later. I personally did not want to always be worried it was growing back and not being detected. Technology can only do so much and is not infallible.
Yes...tamoxifen will help suppress but it's not always enough, and sadly there are many deaths still from breast cancer.
On a positive note...there are less deaths from breast cancer now and slowly improving treatments for women with metastatic disease. However these improved stats are because of standard treatments of surgery and chemo and targeted treatment plus hormone therapy. Your surgeon can't even use the guidelines to tell you what might happen without...as that calculator doesn't exist. Surgeons usually offer the least drastic surgical treatment possible, so if they are recommending surgery I'd be following it.
I suspect now with such great positive response in your mind the problem is gone. The fear wouldn't be there now like at the beginning. However whilst anything remains it is still a risk...and my own thoughts with my treatment was this "I don't want to look back on my choices in 2 years and regret not doing all I could to be cured of breast cancer". You get one shot only at cure.
We all live in fear of return even doing it all. I can't imagine the internal angst that may occur not having surgery. Yes it's your decision and your body, as long as decisions are made with all the risks laid out bare to think about.
Removing the area the cancer was and nodes would reduce the risk of remaining cancer cells.
I too had same pathology but stage 1. I chose a bilateral and sentinel node biopsy. My cancer was difficult to detect via mammogram...actually it was not detected at all but found by myself 5 weeks later. I personally did not want to always be worried it was growing back and not being detected. Technology can only do so much and is not infallible.
Yes...tamoxifen will help suppress but it's not always enough, and sadly there are many deaths still from breast cancer.
On a positive note...there are less deaths from breast cancer now and slowly improving treatments for women with metastatic disease. However these improved stats are because of standard treatments of surgery and chemo and targeted treatment plus hormone therapy. Your surgeon can't even use the guidelines to tell you what might happen without...as that calculator doesn't exist. Surgeons usually offer the least drastic surgical treatment possible, so if they are recommending surgery I'd be following it.
I suspect now with such great positive response in your mind the problem is gone. The fear wouldn't be there now like at the beginning. However whilst anything remains it is still a risk...and my own thoughts with my treatment was this "I don't want to look back on my choices in 2 years and regret not doing all I could to be cured of breast cancer". You get one shot only at cure.
We all live in fear of return even doing it all. I can't imagine the internal angst that may occur not having surgery. Yes it's your decision and your body, as long as decisions are made with all the risks laid out bare to think about.