Is breast cancer worse than other cancer?

SharonMH

Hi  I was just wondering does BC come back more often than other cancers. I keep hearing  that it can come back years later .Why do I hear that  it happens  more with  BC and not with other cancers and why? SharonH

ma111

It can come back years later, however, there are a lot of cancers that never go away to come back. Pancreatic, brain and lung are near death sentences.

Therefore, I really don't think that breast is worst as the survival rate and even the stage IV live longer than do a lot of other cancers. http://www.cancer.gov/

carcharm

That's the million dollar question and one they are researching. How can a cancer cell lay dormant for so many years and than just turn on and start expressing itself.

sweetbean

Interesting topic.  On one hand, if you  have survived 5-8 years,  most other types of cancer don't come back.  That being said, the 5 year survival rate for other types of cancer is a lot worse than for breast cancer.   

NancyD

There are other sneaky cancers that they will not declare "cured" after five years. My sister has sinus cancer. It was first found almost twenty years ago. She had surgery which removed all her upper palette and half her upper jaw. There was no chemo known to be effective, so the only other treatment they offered was radiation...to the head...by her ear and eye. Even with that they could not give her a good prognosis. They said the cancer would come back in 90% of the cases within 15-20 years, so she opted not to have the radiation because it would very likely cause hearing loss, blindness, and loss of taste.

Sixteen years later it came back. She's been dealing with the slow destruction of her face for a year and a half. They still have no chemo that's effective. It's now spread to her lungs and she's hanging on by a thread.

She never smoked or did any other risk-bearing behavior, so like my breast cancer, this came out of the blue.

SharonMH

Hi  NancyD,  I am so sorry to hear about your sister. No cancer is good. I wish her the best. I will keep her in my prayers. SharonH

bak94

Interesting topic. My best friend had hodgkins, her doctor told her if you were to get cancer it was one of the better ones to get. She thought she was cured after 5 years, it came back after 7 years. It was gone for 2 more years and then she got leukemia. Doctor said it wasn't because of the chemo she had, but I still wonder....  She passed away 2 years after being diagnosed with leukemia.

lago

Breast cancer is one of the most "treatable" cancers. It doesn't mean you will be cured but you can live a long time being treated. Many diseases (think diabetes) are treatable but are not curable.

That being said there are many women that are cured. They just have no way of know who that will be. There is a woman  in my building that's a 35 year survivor. I think it's safe to say she's cured.

Outfield

I think it's so hard to answer this, since there is a lot of difference even among different breast cancers.  For examle, a slow-growing estrogen-receptor positive tumour and a fast-growing triple negative tumour have very different chances of progressing very quickly and recurring if more than 5 years out. 

Nancy, I am so sorry to hear about your sister. 

CherylinOhio

I just saw a PS last week and he said melanoma is actually worse than BC.

anonymice

Well, no, it's not - I'm sure it's nowhere near the "best" kind of cancer to have, but you don't need your breasts to survive so if it doesn't go beyond the breast, you will not die of it.  Not true of other cancers that have been mentioned in this post, like lung cancer for instance.

It's also so very common that it is one of the most well-funded forms of cancer - not that there's nearly enough funding, but comparatively speaking.  They'll likely learn how to keep it from killing you before they learn how to keep other types from doing the same - although a cure, I'm not sure. The medical community has set a goal to conquer it by 2020.  It's known as the "breast cancer deadline".  The majority of us will be alive to see that.

 http://www.breastcancerdeadline2020.org/

Sorry for getting off topic a bit here, but I truly and firmly believe that by 2020 it will be much rarer to die from BC.  It's not (only) wishful thinking, I spend my days buried in healthcare literature (for a living, lol).  I do *not* think we will have a cure, but  I think all MBC will be controllable as a chronic disease, as some folks with MBC are already experiencing.  

I would have been dead or close to it by now, almost certainly, 16 months after a diagnosis of IBC, hormone-negative, Her2+++.   (It's those plus signs that would have gotten me for sure!)  But I'm not dead, because of research and drugs developed *very* recently. 

Have hope!!  Things are moving very fast in the breast cancer world.  

Fighter_34

^Your post was uplifting.....

elimar86861

Melanoma can be very sneaky and take a long time to recur.  Recurrences are not as common as breast cancer, but melanoma can spread to almost any organ in the body.  Early detection and surgery gives the best chance to survive melanoma.

With lung, pancreatic and brain cancers, they can be symptomless in the early stages.  By the time it is discovered, many people are already Stage IV.  That is a different kind of sneaky.

dreaming

One goes into remission, but not cured, BC can come back after many years and in any place of the body, no cancer is better or worse, if it is found early enough, if it responds well enough that one goes into remission, This is the goal.

I am a 20 year survivor in remission , but I do not consider myself and neither my doctors.

I had a second cancer Basal Cell Carcinoma, that usually would not kill, but leaves one with terrible scars , to me this was more shocking than B.C. because the only treatment  that gives 90% removal of the lesion is Mohs surgery, and to see my 15 inches scar on my face is hard, specially when I go to work.

I work in a cancer center and to me the worst cancer , is the one that affects children, inclusive babies.