When Should You Get Checked For Breast Cancer

Why Cant I Have Screening Mammograms

A mammogram is not recommended as a regular screening tool for women under 40 .

This is because:

• Breast tissue in this age group is naturally denser than in older women, meaning there is a greater concentration of glandular tissue versus fatty tissue in the breasts.
• Glandular breast tissue appears white on a mammogram, as do cancers, so it can be difficult in this age group to detect small tumours.
• This means young women might be subjected to unnecessary biopsies or cancers may be missed .

Should I Go For Breast Screening

Its important that you have access to enough information about the benefits and harms of breast screening to make the decision.

You can talk to your own doctor or nurse. Or you can contact the Cancer Research UK nurses on freephone 0808 800 4040. The lines are open from 9am to 5pm, Monday to Friday.

• Find out more information about breast screening

How Can I Detect My Breast Cancer Early

The best way for young women to find breast cancer early is to be breast self-aware. Become familiar with your breasts: their shape, size and what they feel like. Learn what is normal for you. Sometimes your breasts may change throughout your monthly cycle. If you are pregnant or nursing, your breasts will change even more dramatically. If you find anything unusual, see your doctor immediately and insist on a diagnosis. In general, women should have a yearly clinical breast examination by a doctor beginning at age 20 and start having annual mammograms beginning at age 45.

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Guidelines For Elective Surgical Options

Women with BRCA1 or BRCA2 mutations face a significant risk of breast and ovarian cancer. Prophylactic removal of the fallopian tubes and ovaries is recommended by about age 40. Many women with BRCA1 or BRCA2 mutations will also elect to have their breasts removed. Nipple-sparing mastectomy is an effective option for these women.

Making the decision to have an elective preventive double mastectomy and removal of the ovaries is personal and should be based on many life factors. You must balance where you are in your childbearing years, what your future choices may be, and whether you would prefer to follow a rigorous screening schedule instead of making such a life-altering choice.

Whatever your decision, we encourage you to make an informed choice. If you do elect to have a preventive double mastectomy, our breast specialists will guide you in the appropriate breast surgery reconstruction to help restore your body image after treatment.

If you are interested in discussing ovary removal surgery , we will refer you to one of our gynecological oncologists.

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What Are The Symptoms Of Breast Cancer

Some of the symptoms include:

• A lump or abnormality in the shape or feel of the breast
• A lump in the underarm area
• A generalized swelling of all or a part of the breast
• An irritation or dimpling of the skin on the breast
• Nipple retraction
• Rash, redness or scaliness on the nipple or breast skin
• Spontaneous discharge from the nipple

Please consult your doctor if you are unsure about a symptom.

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Why Is Breast Screening Important

Breast cancer is the second largest cause of cancer death in Australian women after lung cancer. It is the most common cancer diagnosed in Australian women .

Early detection and appropriate treatment can significantly improve breast cancer survival.

Cancer Council Australia recommends that eligible women participate in the BreastScreen Australia program by having a free mammogram every two years, provided they are aware of the benefits and the risks.

Where To Go To Get Checked For Breast Cancer

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Are Breasts Exams Included In A Well

We recommend the yearly well-woman exam or female physical to all women when they become sexually active or when they reach age 21, whichever happens first. This essential womens health care practice gives you access to our team of board-certified health care practitioners who are also on staff at major metropolitan hospitals. Your safety, comfort, and health are our top priorities.

Included in the well-woman exam are a clinical breast examination, pelvic examination, and a PAP smear. Most major health insurance plans cover these preventive care services one time per year.

The Womens Center at Southside Medical Center offers a full range of gynecological services and treatments. You may add these services to your visit in addition to CBE, checkup, or well-woman exams. Your options include:

• Cancer screenings

Understand Your Family History

Talk with your family members about cancer on both sides of your family.

• If your mother or sister has had breast or ovarian cancer before the age of 50, its recommended you get screened annually with mammogram and ultrasound, from 10 years prior to their age at diagnosis, but not earlier than 30 years of age.
• Women at potentially high risk of breast cancer should be referred to a breast specialist for advice on appropriate screening
• High-risk screening may also include breast MRIs.

While the risk of inherited breast cancer is low, talk about it with your doctor. If you are potentially at high risk, you may be eligible for genetic testing with Genetic Health Service NZ. This assessment would require a referral from your doctor.

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If You’re Trans Or Non

If you’re a trans man, trans woman or are non-binary how you are invited will depend on the sex you are registered with at a GP:

• if you’re registered as female with a GP you will automatically be invited for breast screening
• if you’re registered as male with a GP you will not automatically be invited for breast screening

If you’ve not had top surgery , you can have breast screening.

If you’ve had top surgery, you may still have some breast tissue. But it’s unlikely you will be able to have a mammogram. Talk to a GP if you notice any changes in your chest tissue or symptoms of breast cancer.

If you think you should have breast screening, but you are not invited automatically, talk to your GP surgery or call the local breast screening service to ask for an appointment.

Men Should Get Checked For Breast Cancer: Doctor

Older men and those within certain high-risk categories should be checked regularly for breast cancer, a Tainan doctor said, citing a male patient who was diagnosed with the disease while being treated for hepatitis B and other conditions.

A 65-year-old who was in hospital for hepatitis B, chronic kidney disease and high blood pressure three years ago was also checked for breast cancer when a lump was discovered in his right breast, Kuo General Hospital physician Huang Tai-chien said, adding that the mans family had no history of cancer.

He came to Kuo General Hospital to get a second diagnosis after his regular physician told him he had breast cancer. An examination confirmed stage 1B breast cancer and a tumor of 2.3cm in size, he said.

The hospital performed a total mastectomy and removed a lymphatic node from the mans armpit, followed by chemotherapy and hormone treatment, he said, adding that the man has not experienced any relapse of cancer in the three years since the surgery.

The five-year survival rate for those with stage 1B breast cancer who undergo treatment is 95 percent, he said.

About one in every 100,000 men will develop breast cancer each year, which is 1 percent of the number of women who are affected by the disease, Huang said.

Breast cancer is not an inevitability in men who produce increased estrogen and develop larger breasts, he said.

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General Considerations For Screening

The goal of screening for cancer is to detect preclinical disease in healthy, asymptomatic patients to prevent adverse outcomes, improve survival, and avoid the need for more intensive treatments. Screening tests have both benefits and adverse consequences .

Breast self-examination, breast self-awareness, clinical breast examination, and mammography all have been used alone or in combination to screen for breast cancer. In general, more intensive screening detects more disease. Screening intensity can be increased by combining multiple screening methods, extending screening over a wider age range, or repeating the screening test more frequently. However, more frequent use of the same screening test typically is associated with diminishing returns and an increased rate of screening-related harms. Determining the appropriate combination of screening methods, the age to start screening, the age to stop screening, and how frequently to repeat the screening tests require finding the appropriate balance of benefits and harms. Determining this balance can be difficult because some issues, particularly the importance of harms, are subjective and valued differently from patient to patient. This balance can depend on other factors, particularly the characteristics of the screening tests in different populations and at different ages.

Who Should Be Tested

Previously, the USPSTF recommended that only women who had a family history of breast, ovarian, fallopian tube, or peritoneal cancer be tested for harmful BRCA mutations.

Now, the task force is also recommending additional groups of women get tested, including those who have either personally been diagnosed with either breast, ovarian, fallopian tube, or peritoneal cancer or have an ancestry associated with these cancers like people of Ashkenazi Jewish descent.

But women who have no personal or family risk of these cancers dont need to be assessed, the task force advised.

Women with a history of breast cancer may have had genetic testing years ago that did not show an identifiable BRCA mutation. Over the past 10 years, additional mutations have since been identified, and many women who retested have learned that they do carry a mutation, Dr. Brigid Killelea, the chief of breast surgery at Yale Medicine, told Healthline.

In addition, many women who have a BRCA mutation are more likely to develop a second BRCA-related cancer in the future, Killelea added.

Those who test positive for a mutation should receive genetic counseling and consider interventions to lower their risk as much as possible such as bilateral mastectomy, or the surgical removal of both breasts.

In addition, there may be other ways to reduce risk, including weight management, eating a healthy diet, exercise, and for some, taking a risk reducing medication called tamoxifen, Killelea noted.

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What Exactly Is The Brca Test

It detects harmful variations in the BRCA1 and BRCA2 genes. A positive result means you are at risk of developing breast, ovarian, and other cancers. While there is no way to “rid your body” of a BRCA mutation, “knowledge is power,” says Susan Klugman, MD, director of Reproductive and Medical Genetics at Montefiore Health System and professor of Clinical Obstetrics & Gynecology and Womens Health at Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York City. Knowing the mutation is there gives you options. You can work with your doctor to make sure you are getting the proper screenings , she says. Prophylactic surgeries may also be an option.

Benefits Of Mammography For Women Ages 40

Mammography in women ages 40-49 may lower the risk of dying from breast cancer, but the benefit is less than for older women .

The U.S. Preventive Services Task Force meta-analysis combined the results from 8 randomized controlled trials. It found no clear difference in the risk of dying from breast cancer for women ages 39-49 who got mammograms on a regular basis and their peers who did not get mammograms . If there was a difference, it was likely very small.

There are a few reasons why theres less benefit from mammography for younger women than for older women :

• Women ages 40-49 have a lower risk of breast cancer than older women.
• Younger women tend to have dense breast tissue, which can make abnormal findings hard to see on a mammogram.
• Breast cancers in younger women tend to grow faster than breast cancers in older women. This means mammography every 1-2 years may be less likely to find breast cancers in younger women early, when the chances of survival are highest.

For younger women, there are also some drawbacks of screening mammography.

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How Do I Take Care Of My Breasts

The best thing you can do to protect yourself is to be breast aware from the age of 20. This means knowing how your breasts normally look and feel and regularly checking for any unusual changes.

Your breasts may feel heavy or tender before your period, so the best time to check is after your period finishes, once any discomfort has settled down. Show your doctor if you have any unusual symptoms that don’t go away after your period, particularly if you can feel a lump, or thickened tissue in your breast, or notice a discharge or any skin or nipple changes. Of course, most changes are not caused by breast cancer but its important to have any new changes properly checked.

Should You Be Tested For The Breast Cancer Gene

Most of the more than 232,000 cases of breast cancer that will be diagnosed in the United States this year are not due to a faulty gene passed down through families. As with most other cancers, they happen because of genetic mutations that happen as we age.

But about 15% of women with breast cancer have at least one relative who has also had the disease, and 5% to 10% have specific inherited mutations in one of two genes that have been linked to breast cancer, known as BRCA1 and BRCA2.

These mutations are serious. Women with a BRCA1 or BRCA2 mutation face a dramatically increased lifetime risk of breast cancer â 55% to 85%, compared with about 13% for women with no inherited genetic risk. Ovarian cancer risk is higher, too â about 39% of women with BRCA1 and 11% to 17% of women with BRCA2 will get ovarian cancer. BRCA-linked breast cancers also tend to develop at a younger age than other breast cancers.

Women diagnosed with these mutations sometimes choose to have preventive surgery to remove their breasts and/or ovaries before they can get cancer.

Angelina Jolie and Christina Applegate both underwent double mastectomies after testing positive for a BRCA mutation. Jolie lost her mother to ovarian cancer, and Applegateâs mom developed both breast and ovarian cancer.

But you may want to consider testing if your family tree includes these signs:

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Who Should Get Tested

A family history of cancer isn’t the only factor to weigh, says Mary Freivogel, the president-elect of the National Society of Genetic Counselors . It isn’t that simple. The National Cancer Institute has developed a series of screening tools to help evaluate whether a woman may have inherited a mutation. For example, if one of your relatives had both breast and ovarian canceror breast cancer that was diagnosed before she turned 50you would be a candidate for the test. If you’re concerned, Freivogel recommends making an appointment with a genetic counselor. All families are different and some signs may not be as obvious, she explains. “What able to do is take a family history and figure out if this is a pattern that concerns something hereditary, or if it is a pattern that’s probably explained by something else.”

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What Are The Breast Cancer Symptoms I Need To Look Out For

People of all ages should be familiar with the normal look and feel of their breasts. If you notice any of the following changes please see your doctor immediately:

• a lump, lumpiness or thickening of the breast
• changes in the skin of a breast, such as puckering, dimpling or a rash
• persistent or unusual breast pain
• a change in the shape or size of a breast
• discharge from a nipple, a nipple rash or a change in its shape.

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How To Do A Breast Self

Increased Breast Cancer Risk

Some women have an increased risk of developing breast cancer. Having an increased risk doesnt mean that you will get cancer, but they must receive more frequent testing. Aging only adds to the increased risk. Risk factors for breast cancer include:

• Carrying a related genetic mutation
• Lobular carcinoma history
• Strong family history of breast cancer
• Having received radiation treatment to the chest
• Having had breast cancer already

Contact us if you believe you may be at an increased risk of breast cancer. We can offer personalized support and recommendations for your testing protocol. Women who have a high risk of breast cancer should begin mammogram testing before age 40. These women may also need an MRI in combination with mammograms.

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