Because of all types of breast cancer, carcinoma occurs most often, it is often referred to simply as breast cancer.
Given the tendency of such tumors to late detection, it should be noted an extremely high percentage of deaths in patients who suffer from them. Another reason for the high mortality from breast cancer mammologists consider the wrong approach to sex education of girls - their future patients.
What is breast carcinoma?
The term "carcinoma" was introduced by the famous ancient Greek healer Hippocrates, whose appearance of the tumor was associated with crab.
Modern medical statistics show that in the last decade the incidence of carcinoma of the mammary glands( comprising seventy cases per hundred thousand women) has increased significantly.
Annually six million cases of oncological diseases are registered all over the world. Since the age of the majority of cancer patients refers to the age category over fifty years, physicians associate this with the general aging of the world's population.
Causes of
Because the exact causes triggering the mechanism of the tumor process are still unknown, experts suggest that breast cancer can develop under the influence of a number of factors:
- Hereditary predisposition. The fact that the risk of developing breast carcinoma in a woman whose next relatives are already suffering from this disease is already several times proven.
- Already transferred and successfully cured breast carcinoma. The probability of tumor development in the tissues of another mammary gland in this case remains quite high.
- Individual characteristics of the development of the reproductive system: too early( up to eleven years) menarche, belated( after thirty-five years) pregnancy, deliberate abandonment of breastfeeding of the baby, and later( about sixty years) the onset of menopause. Great risk of breast cancer in never giving birth to women.
- Presence of a benign tumor of ( fibroadenoma) or cystic mastopathy in the mammary gland.
- Continuous intake of oral contraceptives for at least five years.
- Continuous( for more than three years) application of hormonal drugs during menopause .
- Radiation exposure to ( when working in hazardous production or when living in an environmentally unfavorable area).
- A series of endocrine diseases ( reduced thyroid function, diabetes, various metabolic disorders leading to overweight).
All of these factors are only supposedly capable of provoking the development of breast cancer, but the presence of several of them is a sign that a woman on time paid attention to her health and regularly visited the mammologist's office.
Symptoms of
The clinical manifestations of breast carcinoma may vary depending on its shape, the stage of the tumor process and the extent of the lesion.
The main symptomatology requiring immediate attention to a qualified specialist is:
- The presence of a dense, painless, tubercular neoplasm in the tissues of the mammary gland found during its palpation and localized most often directly under the nipple( and sometimes in its other part).
- Changes in the appearance of the skin of the affected breast: they can wrinkle or become condensed, becoming an orange peel;often changes in their color( the skin over the tumor is often yellowish, cyanotic or reddened).In the area of the nipple, ulceration sometimes occurs.
- Reflection in the mirror often shows a difference in the configuration and size of both mammary glands: one of them can significantly increase, becoming retracted or excessively convex.
- The presence of enlarged lymph nodes in the axillary region( in a healthy person they are not probed).In the presence of pathology, the lymph nodes acquire the appearance of small painful globules. Their consistency can be as soft or dense.
- When pressing on the nipple, bloody discharge or substance of yellow or pink color may appear.
- Carcinoma can be masked for any inflammatory processes that are characteristic of the mammary glands( most often for mug and face).Therefore at the first signs of such diseases it is necessary to see the doctor.
Types of
Breast carcinoma happens:
- is non-invasive( in the medical literature it is called "carcinoma in situ");
- is invasive.
Non-invasive carcinoma is an early form of a malignant tumor that has not yet grown into the surrounding tissues and is perfectly treatable. A noninvasive form of breast cancer is localized in one of the lobules of the breast or in the milky duct.
The invasive( infiltrating) form of the breast carcinoma, which is no longer an isolated tumor element, but a process that extends to adjacent tissues, is more aggressive and more difficult to treat.
Infiltrating breast cancer is divided into:
- , the pre-invasive duct carcinoma , which has not yet left the milky duct, but provides signs of an early transformation into an infiltrative form of cancer;
- infiltrative duct carcinoma - a malignant process that gradually captured the milky ducts and spread to fatty tissue of the mammary glands. Atypical cells of infiltrative carcinoma easily penetrate into the blood and lymph, spreading with their current throughout the body. The infiltrative form of breast cancer accounts for 80% of all malignant breast tumors.
Histological types
Lobular
Lobular carcinomas affecting the tissues of the lobules of the mammary glands and most often localized in their upper-outer quadrants are infiltrating and non-infiltrating.
Women aged forty-five to forty-eight are at risk of developing a lobular type carcinoma.
Differ by the extreme speed of spreading through the tissues of the breast and the tendency to defeat both mammary glands.
Protocol
Intra-ductular carcinomas of the breast also have an infiltrating and non-infiltrating form. The site of their primary localization is the walls of the milk ducts. The characteristic configuration of ductal tumors that reach from one to ten centimeters in diameter is oval or stellate, the consistence is dense.
Mucinous carcinoma
This kind of carcinoma is often referred to as mucosal cancer due to the presence of mucus( produced by cancer cells), which clogs the milk ducts and impregnates the tissues of the lobules of the mammary glands.
Mucous cancer occurs only in women older than 60 years of age. He accounts for no more than five percent of breast cancer.
Clinical stages of
The establishment of the clinical stage of breast cancer is performed by the attending physician only after a comprehensive examination of the patient.
- The zero stage of is characterized by the presence of a small non-invasive tumor localized in the ductal duct or in the glandular tissue of the breast and complete absence of external manifestations. Being detected in the process of performing a preventive mammogram, carcinoma of zero degree is perfectly treated. The 10-year survival rate of patients is at least 98%.
- Cancer of the first stage of is characterized by the appearance of a small( not exceeding 2 cm) tumor, the absence of lymph node involvement and distant metastases. With proper treatment, the 10-year survival forecast is about 96%.
- Carcinoma of the second stage is a neoplasm with a diameter of two to five centimeters, affecting from one to three axillary lymph nodes and not yet giving distant metastases. Ten-year survival rate of patients is 70-90%.
- For breast cancer, the third stage is characterized by the presence of a tumor exceeding five centimeters in diameter, the adhesion of the axillary lymph nodes, metastasis to the supraclavicular lymph nodes and the absence of distant metastases. The 10-year prognosis for the life of patients does not exceed 10%.
- The cancer of the fourth stage is characterized by the spread of the tumor( it can be of any size) to other organs. The 10-year survival forecast does not exceed 10%.