Treatment of breast cancer: conventional methods of treatment

An overview of today's traditional treatment of breast cancer written by a survivor of breast cancer. His team of doctors will make treatment recommendations based on the stage of your cancer. Standard treatment options may include surgery, chemotherapy, radiotherapy and hormone therapy. If you have been diagnosed with DCIS or LCIS, your stage is the lowest and the road will be easier to travel. For ductal carcinoma in situ, the options can include lumpectomy or mastectomy with or without radiation therapy and hormone therapy. LCIS ??treatments options are a little 'different. They include the observation to determine changes, hormone therapy to prevent the development of cancer, or bilateral prophylactic (preventive) mastectomy. Things get more complicated when the cancer has spread beyond the ducts or lobes / lobules. Since her cancer has been staged to determine their treatment options. Usually include surgery, radiotherapy, chemotherapy and / or hormone therapy. For IBC, treatment options are similar to other types of breast cancer, but always include chemotherapy because of their aggressiveness. Surgery: Surgery may be a breast lumpectomy, in which the tumor is removed, or a partial or modified radical mastectomy. With a mastectomy, is often followed by radiotherapy. In this way you can keep your chest and studies have shown no difference in survival rates between lumpectomy / radiation and mastectomy. Note: Not long ago, they used to perform a radical mastectomy, where the breasts were cut off all the lymph nodes, and the underlying muscles. Fortunately, medicine has discovered that it is not necessary. Now, a partial or modified radical mastectomy is done, when part of the breast tissue or the entire breast, lymph nodes and possibly removed. Overall, not bad for a mastectomy surgery, although everyone is different. I found two of my very easy, but you wake up with drainage tubes, which usually have at least a week. Chemotherapy: Chemotherapy is defined by Wikipedia as the use of chemicals to treat the disease. In its modern usage, refers primarily to cytotoxic drugs used to treat cancer. This can be a daunting prospect for anyone. We have all heard horror stories about how chemotherapy can be very debilitating. However, much progress has been made in the management of the side effects of chemotherapy, so that when you have the right management tools, you can continue to enjoy activities you normally do. Chemotherapy is a systemic way to treat cancer and is generally recommended for those whose tumor is larger than a certain size and / or the cancer has spread to lymph nodes. The idea is that if the cancer has had the opportunity to access the rest of the body, treatment must be systemic. Radiation: Radiation therapy is usually an option for local treatment, the damaged cells that are rapidly dividing. Cancer cells divide rapidly, so that radiation is an effective option. Usually, radiation therapy is given for about six weeks, five days a week. It 'much like the lie still for an X-ray, instead of lasting only a second or two, takes a few minutes. It can cause fatigue at the end and a little 'later, and can cause a burn on the skin. Hormone Therapy: Many breast cancer are hormone dependent. In these types of cancer, there are receptors in tumors that can be filled with estrogen. The idea is that when you fill these estrogen receptors, causing the tumor to grow. This is called estrogen receptor positive (ER). These tumors respond well to hormone therapy and hormone therapy drugs recommended for you will depend on your state of menopause. These drugs are in pill form and taken once a day. The most popular of these drugs for pre-menopausal women, tamoxifen for postmenopausal women Femara and Arimidex. There is new evidence that suggests that taking Femara after taking tamoxifen for five years, increases survival rates. Immunotherapy: There is a fourth type of treatment on the horizon and is called immunotherapy. It's about getting your immune system to fight cancer and is, and will be a large amount of research done in this field.