How is breast cancer treated?
Breast cancer is first treated surgically, the primary tumour is excised or removed, and the lymph nodes from the axilla or the armpit are removed as well to be analysed for cancer. The next step, depending upon the size of the tumour, how the tumour looks under the microscope, if lymph nodes were involved, and depending upon the risk of relapse based upon that initial surgical information, there may be a role for adjuvant chemotherapy to reduce the risk of relapse.At the time of primary surgery there may be cancer cells that are outside of the breast and outside of the armpit, that may grow without being treated and so chemotherapy has a role in reducing the risk of relapse from those cancer cells that may have been left behind.After adjuvant chemotherapy there may be a role for radiation because if a lumpectomy was performed, if only a small portion of the breast was removed, or if the primary tumour was larger than 5 centimetres, or if there were more than 4 lymph nodes that were positive for metastatic in the armpit, then there may be a role for radiation for reducing a local recurrence, in other words, the breast cancer from coming back in the chest or in the armpit. Following that there may be a role for hormonal therapy, if the breast cancer has receptors for estrogen or progesterone, there may be a role for temoxaphen or for an aromatase inhibitor which are both hormonally mediated medications which can reduce a woman's risk of relapse of an hormonally sensitive cancer.
