Breast cancer -
if you or your partner has received this diagnosis, many questions arise.Here
we have collected the most important 50 facts about the disease!
1. Breast cancer
is the most common cancer of the woman. Every year over
70,000 women in Germany contract breast cancer.
2. Men can also develop
breast cancer. In Germany, 600 to 700 men are diagnosed
with breast cancer each year .
3. Nearly half of all
breast cancer diagnoses (approximately 45%) are made in women between
the ages of 50 and 69 years . That is why women are invited to
mammograms every two years during this period.
4. Age is a risk
factor: just under every fifth breast cancer diagnosis is made in
women younger than 50 years old.
5. From the age of 70, a
woman's risk of developing breast cancer decreases.
6. The cure rate of breast cancer has improved significantly in the past few
decades: from 50 to 60 percent in the 50s and 60s to 75 to 80 percent today.
7. Despite good chances
of recovery, more than 17,000 women still die each year in Germany from breast
cancer.
8. Approximately 30% of
all women with breast cancer in Germany have a familial burden of
breast cancer and can have a screening for "breast cancer
genes" performed.
9. There are several
genes that can cause breast and ovarian cancer if they are altered. Known
and researched are the genes BRCA1 and BRCA2.
10. In about 5 out of
100 women, changes in the breast cancer genes BRCA1 and BRCA2 can be
detected.
11. 60 out of 100 women
with an altered BRCA1 gene develop breast cancer until the age of 70.
12. 55 out of 100 women
with an altered BRCA2 gene develop breast cancer until the age of 70.
13. In women with
an altered BRCA gene, early detection is more tight-knit and
intensified: they are recommended to undergo semi-annual breast ultrasound and an MRI scan once a year.
14. In a quarter of
women with altered BRCA1 or BRCA2 gene, a tumor develops in
the other breast within 15 years of breast cancer surviving .
15. Smoking is an
influential risk factor for breast cancer. In a Canadian study, the risk
of getting breast cancer was 57 percent higher in
women who had smoked for more than 40 years.
Healthy lifestyle important
16. A quarter of all
breast cancer cases could be prevented by a healthy lifestyle . This
includes little alcohol, regular exercise or sports and non-smoking. Even
a healthy diet (low red meat, lots of fruits and vegetables) can lower the risk
of breast cancer.
17. Women with dense mammary tissue have a higher risk of breast cancer.
18. Ingestion of
environmental toxins (eg bisphenols, polyfluoroalkyls, DES) in
childhood and adolescence may increase the risk of breast cancer in adulthood.
19. Inadequate type
II diabetes ("adult onset diabetes") may increase the risk of
breast cancer . Active prevention is to prevent diabetes through
a healthy lifestyle or, if one exists, to ensure a good blood sugar control.
20. For more precise
determination of breast cancer, the removal of a tissue sample and
its histological examination is always carried out . Then
it can be determined whether the breast cancer is hormone-dependent and whether
the tumor has "docking sites" for the so-called epidermal growth
factor 2 (HER2-positive tumor). Both information is important to be able
to initiate the correct treatment after the operation.
21. Tumors that are
neither HER2-positive nor "docking sites" for the sex hormones
estrogen and progesterone possess, one calls "triple negative" (thus
three-way negative). They are considered more aggressive and difficult to
treat.
22. Basically,
surgery is always done first (if possible). The goal is to remove
the tumor completely, ie without any remaining residues. Often, this is
possible in the context of a breast-maintained therapy, in some cases, the
affected breast must also be completely removed.
23. Complete surgical
removal of the affected breast should be performed if the tumor can not be
completely removed during breast conserving surgery, or if it is an
inflammatory breast cancer, or if the patient may not be irradiated due to a
skin disease, after breast preserving OP but radiation would be required.
24. Reconstructing the
breast does not jeopardize the chance of healing and does not hinder follow-up
25. In 15 of 100
patients, the tumor is HER2-positive.
Anti-hormone therapy makes sense
26. In the case of HER2
positivity, a drug therapy with a corresponding antibody (eg trastuzumab)
should be performed for one year after surgery. Often the gift is also
given together with chemotherapy.
27. For HER2-positive
tumors, treatment with trastuzumab plus chemotherapy may nearly halve the relapse
rate .
28. Three-quarters of
all breast cancer tumors have docking sites for the female sex hormone estrogen
receptor, meaning that cancer growth is hormone-dependent.
29. Antihormone
therapy increases the cure rate in women with
hormone-dependent breast cancer by 30%.
30. Antihormone therapy
halves the risk of developing a tumor in the other breast in patients with
hormone-dependent breast cancer.
31. Anti-hormone
therapy must be for at least 5 to 10 years . Its protective
effect lasts up to ten years after weaning.
32. The standard
treatment for premenopausal antihormonal therapy is tamoxifen (20 mg per day).
33. In
"triple-negative" tumors, chemotherapy is usually performed after
surgery.
34. Chemotherapy
may also be required for other tumors , whenever there is a
high risk of relapse (eg young age of the patient, aggressive tumor or
lymph node involvement).
35. The duration of
so-called adjuvant chemotherapy (ie chemotherapy after breast surgery) is
usually 18-24 weeks.
36. The benefit of
post-operative chemotherapy is particularly high in relapsing and dying risk
among women younger than 50 years.
37. Women with lymph
node involvement benefit particularly from chemotherapy with so-called taxanes
after surgery.
Breast cancer and pregnancy
38. You can get pregnant
after chemotherapy . Patients who want to have children should be
advised about ways to protect their fertility.
39. There are women
who develop breast cancer during pregnancy . Abortion
then does not improve the prognosis, but cancer treatment must begin
immediately in this situation. The surgery is also possible as well as
some chemotherapies that do not harm the child.
40. In women with large
tumors, who can not undergo surgery or in any case require complete
removal of the breast, chemotherapy may be advisable before surgery
41. Following a
breast-conserving surgery, radiotherapy is always performed if the tumor is
classified as aggressive.
42. Supportive
radiotherapy following complete breast removal is required whenever the tumor
has already expanded (tumor stage T3 or T4), the tumor could not be completely
removed during surgery, or the adjacent lymph nodes were affected.
Checkpoint inhibitors as hopefuls
43. The standard
treatment after a breast-conserving operation is the so-called
hypofractionation. The entire breast is irradiated within three weeks on
several days a week.
44. According to a
Heidelberg study from 2016, 83 out of 100 women were disease-free 5 years after
the breast cancer diagnosis, so they had not relapsed.
45. The same study
showed that after 5 years, 85 out of 100 women had no metastases.
46. In 10 of 100 women
who have undergone breast conserving surgery, the cancer reappears within 10
years in the same location.
47. In 4 of 100 women,
even after complete removal of the breast, a new tumor forms in the chest wall.
48. Most commonly, metastases
occur in the bones, lungs, and liver.
49. However, metastases
often depend on the type of breast cancer: hormone-dependent HER2-negative
breast cancer usually causes metastases in the bones, HER2-positive tumors more
frequently lead to brain metastases and "triple negative" tumors
form frequent metastases in the liver and lungs.
50. Metastases are
usually treated with chemotherapy if they are not isolated and can be operated
on or irradiated. Often, depending on the tumor type, new targeted
substances(antibodies, small molecules) are added to the
chemotherapy . Special hopefuls are the so-called checkpoint inhibitors.
0 comments