Article Advise

submitted: Aug 28th 2008 | by: MengY | Total views: 1 | Word Count: 588 | |

The overall average of five-year survival rate for women who contract breast cancer is around 86% for those whose disease has not metastasized. That means, 86% of the women who contract it survive for at least five years. But even that fairly high number is just an overall average. The numbers are even better for some categories. Those numbers depend on the stage at which the cancer is detected and treated.

Just like other forms of cancer, individuals develop breast cancer in stages. Each stage is labeled with both a letter and a number. The cancer types are labeled based on a classification system that has become a cancer standard. These labels are (T, N, and MO and are scaled from 0-IV). A cancer that has been deemed A T is indicative of the cancers size, the N means that the cancer has spread to the individual's lymph nodes and M means distant metastasis. Metastasis means that a tumor is spreading from its primary location to secondary locations throughout the body forming the same tumor types in other locations.

Tumors that have been labeled TX are tumors that aren't capable of being assessed. T0 means that there is no evidence of any cancer. Tis means that an individual has a cancer that might be DCIS (ductal carcinoma in situ), LCIS (lobular carcinoma in situ) or Paget's disease which is a rare form of cancer where the areola and/or nipple is actually cancerous.

Cancers in Stage 0 are in the earliest possible stage. In cancers that are Stage I, the tumors are fewer than 2cm in size and have yet to spread. Stage II cancer means that a tumor has grown to 2-5cm in diameter, and Stage III tumors are larger than 5cm. If an individual has a tumor that is stage IV then it is attached to the chest wall, and has typically spread to the individual's lymph nodes.

Because of the many technological advances for both diagnosis and treatment techniques people are better able to detect their cancer and eliminate it during its earliest stages.

For those women and men treated in Stage 0 or I the average five year survival rates are roughly 100%. Yes, men get breast cancer too, albeit at about 1/133 the rate of women. Even Stage II sufferers have a survival rate between 81%-92%. It isn't until Stage III that the rate dips to 67%. For Stage IV it is approximately 20%.

It is always possible for men and women to beat the odds that are against them. Even individuals who are in their later stages of cancer are capable of surviving for even lengthier periods than expected, even more than seven years. Because of the technological advances in both diagnostic methods and treatment techniques individual's odds are significantly improving.

One new diagnostic technique, for example, is QM-MSP (quantitative multiplex methylation-specific PCR). Discovered in 2001, it is a chemical test that uses fluid from the breast. By analyzing chemical tags on certain genes, it's possible to detect cancer clumps as small as 50 cells with 86% reliability. As it and other innovative methods move into the mainstream, 'early' detection becomes 'earliest possible' detection. That greatly improves the odds of successful treatment.

Treatments are improving, too. Hormone therapy, targeted radiation, molecule specific drugs and other contemporary techniques constitute the cutting edge, where once there was only cutting.

Breast cancer is never pleasant. It will always be a serious condition. Breast cancer doesn't really have to be life threatening or even something that permanently scars; breast cancer doesn't necessarily kill people any longer.

About the Author

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