Recognizing And Battling Breast Cancer

Breast cancer is caused by the uncontrollable growth of cells in the breast that invades nearby tissues and spreads throughout the body. These collections of irrepressible growth of tissue are called tumors or malignant tumors. However, not all tumors are cancerous.

Breast cancer has been diagnosed in large numbers in North America and Europe. In 2001, around 200,000 cases of breast cancer are diagnosed in the United States alone. Each woman has a 1 in 8 risk of developing breast cancer, but the risk of dying from breast cancer is much lower, barely 1 in 28.

The risk of breast cancer is generally higher among older women, women with a family history or previous history of breast cancer, women who received radiation therapy to the chest region, women who began their periods before 12 years of age, women who had menopause after age 50, women who never had children or had them age 30 years of age or women with a genetic mutation. In recent times genetic mutations for breast cancer have become a research topic.

The breast cancer tumor has the following symptoms: lump or thickening that appears in the breast or underarm, change in breast shape, nipple inward followed by unloading without color, red or reduction of skin or nipple, or ridges in the skin of the breast.

If a woman experiences any of these symptoms do not necessarily mean you have breast cancer. In this case you should have a breast cancer personal check. It is estimated that 95% of breast cancer detected by screening staff. The breast cancer personal check includes the review of lumps in the breasts after each menstrual period, wrinkling of the skin, and control of retraction or nipple discharge. For a consistent result, every woman should have a breast cancer personal check at the same time every month. Several other techniques such as mammography, thermography, ultrasound, computed tomography, etc, can also help detect breast cancer.

Breast cancer treatments include surgery to remove the cancerous tissues, with breast-conserving therapy (BCT) being one type of operation. Other breast cancer treatments include chemotherapy, radiotherapy, hormonal therapy and biological therapy. Radiotherapy is a common treatment for breast cancer and radiation treatment and chemotherapy may follow surgery to ensure the destruction of stray cancer cells.

Even after undergoing many or all of these measures for breast cancer treatment, unfortunately almost half of women suffer from a recurrence of the disease.