BREAST CANCER

Breast Cancer

Breast Cancer

Breast cancer is a group of quickly duplicating, undifferentiated cells in the locality of the breast in men and women. The soonest alterations happen in the epithelial cells of the terminal end buds (TEB) of the breast milk ductal system. While the progressive steps of breast cancer are unknown, the cells in the breast trigger a answer of cell reproduction. These new cancer units pattern tumors. If cancerous diseaseous disease cells are active or are considered malign, the tumor grows at tremendous races, and may end up in metastasis. Metastasis is a convoluted process in which cells shatter away from their prime tumors and by the blood provide or through the lymph scheme relocate into other body parts, therefore spreading cancerous diseaseous disease all through the body.

Symptoms

Breast cancer symptoms include an unusual lump, or change in the size or shape of the breast; puckering or dimpling of the skin of the breast; drawing back of the nipple; swelling of the upper arm, or in the armpit, or just above the breast; or pain or discomfort (although pain is only rarely a symptom of breast cancer). Only 1 in 40 women who reports any of these symptoms to a doctor is found to have cancer.

Incidence and Mortality

Breast cancer is the most common cancer in women; a woman's lifetime risk is 1 in 12. In the United Kingdom there are about 32,500 new cases a year and 14,500 deaths. It is a cancer mainly of older women with about half of cases appearing in women who are over 65. It also affects about 220 men a year.

Despite an increasing incidence rate, deaths from breast cancer are starting to decline or level off in many European countries including Britain, where deaths from the disease have fallen by 10 per cent in the past five years. Incidence and mortality vary considerably between countries. Of age-standardized rates, cases per 100,000 women, incidence and mortality are in Australia, 59.6 and 21.41; in England and Wales, 56.1 and 30.27. A study carried out in Miyagi, Japan, produced comparatively low figures of 27.8 and 6.11.

As with most cancers, the earlier breast cancer is diagnosed, the greater the chance of a cure. Stage 1 is a cancer in a very early stage; stage 4 is one which has already spread to many organs. In Britain the survival rates by stage of cancer development are: 84 per ...