Breast Cancer Type and Stage: What You Need to Know?

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Want to learn about breast kits or stage and the different types of breast cancer we're going to teach you all about it

When diagnosed with breast cancer the first question that you invariably get from family and friends is what type of breast cancer do you have and

what stage is your breast cancer interestingly your breast cancer specialists don't focus too much on this why I'll try to explain in this lesson

I'm going to teach you what the different types of breast cancer are predominantly non invasive breast cancer an invasive breast cancer

 I'm then going to pivot and explain to you the five stages of breast cancer starting from stage zero which is more of a

precancerous condition all the way to stage 4 which means cancer spread to other organs in the

body I'm also going to teach you why stage is important but not as important as you might think

in deciding the best cancer treatment options for you so let's get started I'm going to tell you

about the different types of breast cancer now type is a reference to the unique features of cancer cells under the microscope it's different than stage which I'll cover in a few minutes and it's

different than grade so of breast cancer type but one difference you need to know is that pre

cancer cells or DCIS is a is a precancerous condition those are cells that are evolving and we think

might evolve into invasive cancer that can invade other parts of the body and threaten you if not

treated well so that's about 20% of cancers DCIS pre cancer the vast majority is invasive breast cancer and there are two cell types that are the most common one is called invasive ductal

carcinoma and the and that accounts for about 70 percent of breast cancers and invasive lobular

carcinoma which which accounts for about 20% there's some other types typically we treat these

two cancer's generally in the same fashion they generally have the same threat to you within

invasive breast cancer we label some different types of breast cancer based on their receptors and I'll give you a couple of those one is called triple negative breast cancer another is called her2

positive breast cancer and those are two cancer cell types that are more threatening to you and generally chemotherapy is recommended to best treat the vast majority of breast cancers or

hormonal e responsive cancers estrogen sensitive breast cancers and are treated with hormonal

therapies let's cover early stage breast cancer the way we would define that is stage 0 which is pre

 cancer usually defined as DCIS or stage 1 into invasive cancer so I've covered DCIS it's a

precancerous condition we still treat it with surgery radiation sometimes some heat some

 hormonal therapy but let's move out on the side although it does account for about 20% of

people that are diagnosed with breast cancer Stage 1 into early stage and face of breast cancer the outlook is generally very good stage 1 breast cancer is when the tumor is small less than 2

 centimeters in size so less than 3 quarters of an inch in size and there's no evidence of cancer in

the lymph nodes the outlook is excellent we cover survival based on stage elsewhere in the breast

cancer school for patients stage 2 is a little bit more advanced a little bit more threatening for early

 stage breast cancer so once way to simplify it is that stage 2 breast cancer is one that is a little larger than 2 centimeters maybe just over an inch in diameter but no evidence of cancer in the

lymph nodes or possibly small a centimeter in size and there's evidence of cancer in one or two or

three underneath our later stage breast cancer stage 3 and stage 4 breast cancer really make up

later stage breast cancer so let me cover stage 3 breast cancer first stage 3 breast cancer cancer is generally when the tumor is larger maybe 4 5 6 centimeters in size most stage 3 breast cancers

have evidence of cancer in the lymph nodes or multiple lymph nodes not every one of many

inflammatory breast cancer where the cancer presents with swelling and redness and thickening of the skin that is a stage 3 breast cancer but stage 3 breast cancer when we take a deep look and

 look at cat-scans Boden scans and PET scans do not have metastatic disease they do not have

 evidence of cancer that we can find elsewhere in the body and the bone the brain the liver and

other parts of the body so it has yet to spread elsewhere at least that we can find stage 3 breast

 cancer the majority of these patients are treated upfront before surgery with chemotherapy to

shrink the cancer cells to kill any cancer cells that might be elsewhere in the body that we cannot

 find following chemotherapy generally patients undergo surgery and following surgery radiation therapy and then if their tumor is sensitive to estrogen then they undergo hormonal therapy and

 towards stage 4 breast cancer is a real threat to your life that means that we have been able to

determine that cancer has spread and grown in other parts of the body and that's what people die

of of breast cancer generally cancer that is growing elsewhere in the body we typically treat

patients that come to see us at presentation with metastatic disease with either chemotherapy first or hormonal therapy first surgery can play a role for some patients surgery in the breast and

radiation can play a role in a few situations so when you put it all together later stage breast

cancer is a much bigger threat than early-stage breast cancer we can treat it and treat it effectively

early stage breast cancer survival is much better than later stage breast cancer and that's why we

do less chemotherapy with earlier stage breast cancer and more chemotherapy later stage breast cancer so why is breast cancer stage not as important as it was in the past why are my physicians

not telling me immediately what stage I am stage 1 2 3 or 4 well for many many years stage the size

 of the tumor whether cancers in the lymph nodes or it's gone elsewhere was the best way for us to identify patients at low risk probably not needing chemotherapy on high-risk those that would

need chemotherapy but I mean we're talking 20 30 40 years ago now we have much more

sophisticated ways of determining whether cancer is more of a threat we check receptors estrogen progesterone hurt too and others grade we can look under the microscope and see if the cells are

a little bit more angry higher grade versus just becoming cancer and not as angry lower grade we

have genomic assays that look deeper into cancer cells to determine whether someone is at a

higher risk for the cancer coming back you might more benefit from chemotherapy rather than hormonal therapy or radiation or not so we have a lot more sophisticated ways to tailor our

recommendations to treat your cancer to you and as you're getting the sense breast cancer is very

complicated and it's why the breast cancer school for patients recommends that you educate

yourself and engage your physicians to learn more about breast cancer type and breast cancer

stage visit the breast cancer school for patients where we will teach you everything you need to

know we're here to help you get the best possible breast cancer care in your community register on our website to get our list of questions to prepare you for your next doctor visit You can see about Type of Cancer in Stomach

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