Help, Please!

karin01

I have just found out that younger sister has breast cancer. She is 26 years old, carries the mutated BRCA 1 gene, and I am starting to do my research tonight. Last Wednesday, she was seen by a "breast specialist" who ended up performing a needle aspiration on the lump she found in her left breast. He called this afternoon, which I have to say I was very surprised, and said the results were that it is malignant. He then told her to call his office first thing and schedule a time to come in tomorrow because he needed to sit down and discuss everything which could take an hour or two.

What I'm trying to figure out is what exact questions should I be asking him tomorrow? After doing a few hours of research already, I wasn't sure if questions such as, "What kind of cancer is it?" or "Is it invasive or noninvasive?" could even be answered yet or are they questions that need to wait until the lumpectomy? I'm trying to do all the leg work I can for her and all of your help is greatly appreciated.

Thank you everyone in advance for your help and support.

mjm1

Hi Karin,

I'm sorry the two of you are facing this, but it is wonderful that you are there to support your sister.

My Mum was diagnosed in January, following an ultrasound, mammogram and fine needle biopsy. At that stage they were able to tell that it was cancer (i.e. malignant), that it was invasive, and give her a rough idea of the size of the invasive and in-situ parts of the tumour. And to get some reassurance that early breast cancer is "very liveable" (though we still felt like it was a death sentence at that point).

That info was given by mums regular doctor. She was the referred to a surgeon, and after surgery we found out the type of cancer, and that the lymph nodes were clear.

In some cases they do a core biopsy and have more info before surgery about the type of cancer it is.

Straight after seeing the surgeon she was able to arrange to have scans to check her bones and organs, to see whether there were any signs of it having spread.

I'm not sure the exact role of a breast specialist (we're in Australia so slightly different) - mum's regular doctor wasn't able to give much more info at the early stage, but given the BRCA1 background, it's possible there may be some discussion here or down the track of prophylactic surgeries as well maybe?

Until we knew the pathology results after surgery we didn't know what treatments would be recommended. In some cases these days they offer neo-adjuvant treatment, which is chemo given before surgery to shrink the tumour.

Mum was told by a breast nurse to focus on one step at a time, and this was quite useful. Of course we wanted to prepare ourselves as much for everything else as well, but it would have been easy to get distracted about the possible treatments after surgery, when it was really important to focus on making decisions and preparing for surgery. There is just so much info in the early weeks.

She is lucky to have you. It's a horrible time (often actually feels better once you know exactly what you're dealing with.)

Big hugs xo - mjm

karin01

Thank you. Unfortunately, my mom went through this herself in her late 40's. Breast cancer is something that runs in our family, the mutated BRCA1 gene, which I am lucky enough not to have. But now that my little sister has breast cancer it almost makes me feel guilty so, supporting her as much as I can is least I can do. The "breast specialist" is actually the surgeon, which we are meeting with sometime today so I guess we'll leave there knowing if it is an invasive cancer or not and maybe an idea of the size. The rest of my questions will have to wait to be answered until a later time. 

Thank you again for your response!

Moderators

Hi Karin01, welcome to the Breastcancer.org community.

Be sure to let us know how the meeting with the surgeon went. 

Kind thoughts to you and your family during this time.

From all -The Mods-