Archive for the 'Stage 3 Breast Cancer' Category
September 8th, 2009 -- Posted in Stage 3 Breast Cancer |
IRVINE, Calif., Sep 10, 2009 (BUSINESS WIRE) — The HALO Pap Test for the Breast — which helps assess a woman’s risk of developing breast cancer — will be featured this Friday Sept. 11 on the popular daytime healthcare talk show by co-host Lisa Masterson, MD, an ob/gyn in Santa Monica, Calif.
“Having Dr. Masterson discuss HALO on national TV provides a tremendous opportunity to spread the word to women about the importance of understanding and managing breast cancer risk. Risk management is a critical step toward reducing breast cancer incidence and death rates,” said John Stroh, president and CEO of NeoMatrix, which makes the HALO system.
HALO is FDA-cleared for the collection of nipple aspirate fluid for cytological evaluation. Like the Pap test for cervical cancer, HALO looks for cellular changes years before breast cancer might develop. Multiple studies have shown that if a woman has abnormal cells in the breast ducts, she has a 4-5 times greater risk of developing breast cancer in the future.
Early detection of breast cancer is the key to improved survival, yet 70 percent of diagnosed women have no identifiable risk factors other than age. In fact, 8 out of 9 diagnosed with breast cancer have no direct relatives with the disease. Risk assessment with HALO enables women and clinicians to take control of breast health. Designed for women age 25 and older, the simple, 5-minute test is typically performed as part of the annual well-woman visit in a physician’s office.
HALO is not intended to diagnose breast cancer or replace regular screening mammography or breast exams. It is a tool that helps identify women with precancerous changes who have a high risk of developing breast cancer in the future. All women, regardless of their risk assessment, should undergo routine screening as recommended by their healthcare provider.
To learn more about the test and locate a physician who offers it, visit www.PapTestForTheBreast.com or call (877)-HALOPAP.
About NeoMatrix
NeoMatrix(C) develops innovative devices that allow women and their doctors to promote optimal breast health. The HALO Breast Pap Test is the first fully automated, noninvasive breast disease-screening device designed for use in the primary care setting. For further information, visit www.neomatrix.com.
Technorati Tags: breast cancer, breast exam, detection, diagnose, HAL, healthy, mammography, news
September 3rd, 2009 -- Posted in Stage 3 Breast Cancer |
According to recent research from the United States, “A diagnosis of metastatic breast cancer (BC) forces patients and providers to make difficult treatment decisions. To pilot test a decision aid (DA) for advanced BC. Pretest, posttest study.”
“Two academic cancer centers in Boston, Massachusetts. Fifty patients diagnosed with advanced BC. A patient DA that consisted of a 30-minute DVD and booklet. Patients were surveyed at baseline, after the intervention, and at 3 months. included use and acceptability of DA, distress, treatment goals, and preference for and actual participation in decisions. Physicians were surveyed at baseline and 3 months. included treatment goals, assessment of patients’ experience with treatments, and patients’ preference for and actual participation in decisions. Thirty-two patients (64%) enrolled and completed the baseline survey, 30 completed the postvideo survey, and 25 completed the 3-month survey. The DA was acceptable and did not increase distress. The majority desired to share decision making with their doctor. Only 38% achieved their desired level of participation. At baseline, agreement between patients and providers on the main goal of treatment (lengthen life v. relieve symptoms) was 50% (kappa = -0.045, P = 0.71), and at 3 months it was 74% (kappa = 0.125, P = 0.48). It is feasible to perform a clinical trial of a DA with advanced BC patients. Most participants wanted to participate in decisions about their care and found the DA acceptable,” wrote K.R. Sepucha and colleagues, Harvard University (see also Breast Cancer).
The researchers concluded: “This study highlights several issues in developing and implementing DAs in this vulnerable population facing complex decisions..”
Sepucha and colleagues published their study in Medical Decision Making (Is There a Role for Decision Aids in Advanced Breast Cancer? Medical Decision Making, 2009;29(4):475-482).
For additional information, contact K.R. Sepucha, Harvard University, Massachusetts General Hospital, School Medical, Health Decis Research Unit, 50 Staniford St., Suite 936, Boston, MA 02114, USA.
Publisher contact information for the journal Medical Decision Making is: Sage Publications Inc., 2455 Teller Rd., Thousand Oaks, CA 91320, USA.
Technorati Tags: breast cancer, metastatic, symptoms, treatment
August 20th, 2009 -- Posted in Breast Cancer News, Breast Cancer Signs, Stage 3 Breast Cancer |
Chapter Five of Breast Cancer? Breast Health! by Susun Weed
Available at www.Ash-Tree-Publishing.com
Perhaps no aspect of breast cancer is more widely publicized than screening mammography. Ads on television, in magazines, and in the daily paper urge women to deal with fear about breast cancer by having a yearly mammogram. We’re even told that doing this is a way to “really care for yourself.”
But screening mammograms don’t prevent breast cancer. A mammogram is an x-ray and x-rays cause cancer. The ads promoting regular screening mammography are paid for by those who stand to profit from their widespread acceptance and use-the manufacturers of the equipment and x-ray film. Whose health does this technology really benefit? Women’s health? Or corporate health?
Should you have a screening mammogram? At what age? How frequently? Science hasn’t agreed on answers to these questions.1 I believe that my anti-cancer lifestyle (see page xv) will decrease my risk of dying from breast cancer in a way that regular mammograms won’t. I care for my breasts with infused herbal oils, regular loving touch, organic foods, and healthy exercise-and forgo regular screening mammograms. Of course, you can do it all in the Wise Woman Tradition. The point is to pay attention to your breasts.
A mammogram uses radioactive rays to “see” breast tissues. X-rays are known to cause DNA damage in breast cells.
A diagnostic mammogram is used when a woman or her practitioner feels a lump and wants to see it. (Sonograms-a non-radioactive test-can be used instead.) Most diagnostic mammograms are not one x-ray, but a series of x-rays.
A screening mammogram is done on a healthy woman to determine if there are unsuspected signs of cancer, such as a shadow or micro-calcifications. A screening mammogram is not one x-ray, but a series of x-rays, usually two per breast, four in all.
Low-radiation mammograms are safer mammograms, but less radiation means a fuzzier picture. Standard x-rays-rarely used any more for breasts-create an easy-to-interpert high-radiation image. Xerograms use half that radiation, but are twice as hard to read. Film-screen mammography, the latest very-low-radiation exam, gives an image that’s even more difficult to interpret. More than 10 percent of all screening mammograms done at one large center in 1992 couldn’t be read and had to be redone.2
A 1994 study showed wide variation in the accuracy with which mammograms are interpreted. Understandably, those who read screening mammograms regularly are more accurate than those who rarely do; in some hospitals, however, work loads are so heavy that accuracy suffers from lack of time, not inexperience.
Roughly 8 out of 10 “positive” mammographic reports are “false positive,” that is, a subsequent biopsy does not confirm the presence of cancer. And as many as half (10-15 percent at an excellent facility) of all “negative” mammographic reports are “false negative.” 3
According to current data, if all American women 40-50 years old were screened yearly by mammogram, 40 out of every 100 breast cancers would be missed.4 If all women over 50 were screened, 13 out of every 100 breast cancers would be missed. Half of all breast cancers in women under 45 are invisible on a mammogram.5 Screening mammograms often miss the deadliest breast cancers: fast-growing tumors in premenopausal women.
Neither diagnostic nor screening mammograms detect cancer. Mammograms can reveal areas of dense tissue in the breasts. These areas may be cancer, or may be associated with cancer, or may be normal tissue, but a mammogram can’t tell.6 The only medically accepted way to tell is to do a biopsy. Over 80 percent of the biopsies done to follow up on a suspicious screening mammogram find no cancer.
Women find their own breast cancers most of the time. (Ninety percent of the time according to one English study.7)
Monthly breast self-exam (or breast self-massage) provides early detection at lower cost, with no danger-and more pleasure-than yearly screening mammograms.
Most breast cancers (80 percent) are slow growing, taking between 42 and 300 days to double in size. A yearly mammogram could find these cancers 8-16 months before they could be felt, but this “early detection” does little to improve the already excellent longevity of women with slow-growing, non-metastasized breast cancers.
The 20 percent of breast cancers that are fast growing are the trouble-makers. They can double in size in 21 days. Monthly breast self-exams are much more likely to find these aggressive cancers than are yearly mammograms. (A 21-day doubling cancer will be visible on a mammogram only 6 weeks before it can be felt.) If you massage or examine your breasts even six times a year, you can take action on fast-growing lumps. If you rely on mammograms exclusively, the cancer could grow undetected for months.
In a recent look at 60,000 breast cancer diagnoses in the United States, 67 percent were found by the woman or her doctor -and over half of these were not visible on a mammogram-while 33 percent were discovered by mammogram. (This may seem like a substantial number of cancers found by mammography, but the majority of them were in situ cancers, a controversial type of cancer that may-but often does not-progress to invasive cancer.)
Technorati Tags: biopsy, breast cancer, Breast Cancer News, dense tissue, mammogram, mammography, self-exam
June 17th, 2009 -- Posted in Stage 3 Breast Cancer |
Breast Cancer is a sickness where in the cancer cells became abnormal, in this manner, cancer cells immediately grow and divide speedily than the healthy cells. Tumors are some cancer cells that form growths. Some tumors immediately grow, and sizes of tumors are all increasing.
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Technorati Tags: breast cancer, cancer cells, tumor
June 9th, 2009 -- Posted in Stage 3 Breast Cancer |
Biology and biography were the buzzwords at a panel convened on cancer nutrition at the 2009 Nutrition and Health Conference: State of the Science and Clinical Applications. Panel members offered a primer on the various nutrition strategies that are available to cancer patients.
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Technorati Tags: breast cancer, cancer nutrition
