Breast Cancer : Standard Treatments

by National Institute on Aging

(Page 4 of 5)

Quiz

1. Staging is a term that means finding out how far cancer has progressed.

TRUE is the correct answer. Staging is a careful attempt to find out whether the cancer has spread and, if so, to what parts of the body. Knowing the exact stage of the disease helps the doctor plan treatment.

2. Breast cancer that is found at a very late stage is known as breast cancer in situ.

FALSE is the correct answer. Breast cancer in situ is early stage cancer. It is confined to the breast and has not spread to the lymph nodes or to other organs of the body. Doctors sometimes refer to this type of cancer as non-invasive breast cancer.

3. Women with breast cancer should receive the same treatment no matter what stage cancer they have.

FALSE is the correct answer. Each woman's case is different, and the choice of treatment is based on many factors, including the size of the tumor, its location in the breast, and whether it has spread to other parts of the body. For stage I, II or III cancers, the main goals are to treat the cancer and prevent it from coming back. For stage IV cancer, the goal is to improve symptoms and prolong survival.

Standard Treatments

There are a number of treatments for breast cancer, but the ones women choose most often - alone or in combination - are surgery, radiation therapy, chemotherapy, and hormone therapy.

Here is what the standard cancer treatments are designed to do:

• Surgery takes out the cancer.
• Hormone therapy keeps cancer cells from getting the hormones they need to survive and grow.
• Radiation therapy uses high-energy beams to kill cancer cells and shrink tumors.
• Chemotherapy uses anti-cancer drugs to kill cancer cells.

Treatment for breast cancer may involve local or whole body therapy. Doctors use local therapies, such as surgery or radiation, to remove or destroy breast cancer in a specific area. Whole body, or systemic, treatments like chemotherapy, hormonal, or biological therapies are used to destroy or control cancer throughout the body. Some patients have both kinds of treatment.

If you have early-stage breast cancer, one common treatment available to you is a lumpectomy combined with radiation therapy. A lumpectomy is surgery that preserves a woman's breast.

Treatment Decisions

In a lumpectomy, the surgeon removes only the tumor and a small amount of the surrounding tissue. The survival rate for a woman who has this therapy plus radiation is similar to that for a woman who chooses a radical mastectomy, which is complete removal of a breast.

If you have breast cancer that has spread locally - just to other parts of the breast - your treatment may involve a combination of chemotherapy and surgery. Doctors first shrink the tumor with chemotherapy and then remove it through surgery. Shrinking the tumor before surgery may allow a woman to avoid a mastectomy and keep her breast.

In the past, doctors would remove a lot of lymph nodes near breast tumors to see if the cancer had spread. Some doctors are also using a method called sentinel node biopsy. Using a dye or radioactive tracer, surgeons locate the first or "sentinel" lymph node closest to the tumor, and remove only that node to see if the cancer has spread.

Radiation Treatment

If the breast cancer has spread to other parts of the body, such as the lung or bone, you might receive chemotherapy and/or hormonal therapy to destroy cancer cells and control the disease. Radiation therapy may also be useful to control tumors in other parts of the body.

Quiz

1. Which is NOT a standard treatment for breast cancer?

A. surgery to remove the cancer
B. chemotherapy to kill cancer cells
C. bed rest to see if the cancer will go away on its own
D. radiation therapy to shrink tumors

C is the correct answer. Although it is theoretically possible for cancer to go away on its own without treatment, this is extremely rare and not a recommended method for treating cancer.

2. Which of the following is a local treatment for breast cancer?

A. surgery
B. hormone therapy
C. biological therapy
D. chemotherapy

A is the correct answer. Surgery, a local treatment, only treats the cancer at the site on the body where the surgery is performed. Surgery on the breast cannot remove cancer that may have spread to other parts of the body. To treat cancer that has spread, doctors use systemic therapies, such as hormones, chemotherapy, and biological therapies that cover most of the body.

3. If a woman has a lumpectomy, the surgeon

A. removes only the tumor and a small amount of surrounding tissue from the breast.
B. removes her entire breast.
C. removes both breasts.

A is the correct answer. In a lumpectomy, the surgeon removes only the tumor and a small amount of the surrounding tissue in the breast. Removing the entire breast is called a mastectomy. The survival rate for a woman who has a lumpectomy plus radiation is similar to that for a woman who chooses a radical mastectomy.

4. A sentinel node biopsy is done by first

A. radiating the cancerous area.
B. removing the breast.
C. using a dye or radioactive tracer to locate the first node closest to the tumor.
D. doing a clinical breast exam.

C is the correct answer. A sentinel node biopsy removes only the node closest to the tumor and spares the rest of the breast. The dye is used to locate this node.

About the Author

www.nia.nih.gov
NIA, one of the 27 Institutes and Centers of NIH, leads a broad scientific effort to understand the nature of aging and to extend the healthy, active years of life. In 1974, Congress granted authority to form NIA to provide leadership in aging research, training, health information dissemination, and other programs relevant to aging and older people.