October is breast cancer awareness month.

October is breast cancer awareness month. One of our top priorities as healthcare providers is educating women on their breast health. To put it in simple words knowledge is key and early detection saves lives.

Breast cancer starts in the breast cells, but if undetected and untreated it can invade the surrounding tissues. Unfortunately, when this process begins cancer cells travel to other parts of the body and begin damaging other tissues and organs. This process is called metastasize.

Breast cancer is the most common cancer in the female population and the second most common in the entire population in Albania. The good news is that when breast cancer is detected early, and is in the localized stage, in the 5-year relative survival rate is 99%. Early detection includes doing monthly breast self-exams and scheduling regular clinical breast exams and mammograms.

Many breast cancer symptoms are invisible and not noticeable without a professional screening, but some symptoms can be caught early just by being proactive about your breast health. Every month, a couple of days after your menstrual cycle it is suggested to check your breasts and armpit area with your fingertips. Don’t forget to also use a mirror!

What to look out for?

•     Nipple tenderness or a lump or thickening in or near the breast or underarm area;

•     A change in the skin texture or an enlargement of pores in the skin of the breast;

•     A lump in the breast;

•     Any unexplained change in the size or shape of the breast;

•     Dimpling anywhere on the breast;

•     Unexplained swelling of the breast;

•     Unexplained shrinkage of the breast;

•     Recent asymmetry of the breasts;

•     Nipple that is turned slightly inward or inverted;

•     Skin of the breast, areola, or nipple that becomes scaly, red, or swollen or may have ridges or pitting resembling the skin of an orange;

•     Any nipple discharge, particularly clear discharge or bloody discharge.

When you see any of the changes mentioned above you should see a healthcare provider as soon as possible, although these can be normal changes of the breasts, it is better to be sure!

Breast cancer can be diagnosed through multiple tests, including a mammogram, ultrasound, MRI, and biopsy. Even if no changes are detected during your monthly self-examination, it is suggested that women 40 and older should have mammograms every 1 or 2 years. Women who are younger than 40 and have risk factors for breast cancer should also ask their healthcare professional whether mammograms are advisable and how often to have them. If the mammogram shows an abnormal area of the breast, your doctor will order additional tests offering clearer, more detailed images of that area. If your initial exams are not conclusive, your doctor may recommend a breast MRI to assess the size and specific location within the breast. An MRI can also identify any other abnormal findings within the breast.

Once a person is determined to have a malignant tumor or the diagnosis of breast cancer, the healthcare team will determine breast cancer staging to communicate how far the disease has progressed. In general, there are five treatment options, and most treatment plans include a combination of the following: surgery, radiation, hormone therapy, chemotherapy, and targeted therapies. Some are local, targeting just the area around the tumor. Others are systemic, targeting your whole body with cancer fighting agents.

To finish this in detail article about breast cancer we must know that the survival rate (MIR- mortality to incidence ratio), which is calculated as the ratio between the total number of deaths from breast cancer and the number of new cases for a given year, during the recent years have been roughly 0.3. This means that there is a low number of women dying from breast cancer compared to the number of new cases diagnosed for the year under review. Therefore, slowly but surely the propaganda regarding self-checks and screening of the breasts is giving its benefits.