About a radiology dx w/out biopsy

Golden, My radiologist told me that he was concerned about the appearance of these tiny areas on my breast. So he did the biopsy a week later and within the week I had the dx, which he had kind of semi warned me about. So it wasn't a complete shock, though I was certainly not pleased. He did tell me it was a Stage 0, non-invasive. Which is good news. I think they get good at spotting these things - and if there was any worry about invasion, I think they'd mention it. I mean, I wouldn't want to tell someone not to to worry in cases where I thought they might have to worry later on. (If that makes any sense.)

I'm sure people will tell you that nothing is certain till after the lumpectomy report, but why not go with what an experienced radiologist thinks, for now? 

It is certainly a frightening and worrisome time. I wish I had more words of wisdom and reassurance for you. I am sending good thoughts your way!

Jill

goldenlotus,

I have DCIS.  I too went through years of fertiltity drugs and treatment and have wondered if all that lead to this.  In my thinking if it did, oh well.  That treatment and only that treatment was the only way I could become a mother, short of adoption.  (Nothing wrong with adoption but it is even more difficult, lengthier, sometimes more expensive, and not as a sure thing as some people would have you believe, unless you are willing to adopt an older child).  If I knew definitively that fertilty drugs have an extremely high correlation with later development of DCIS, I would still have done the treatments in a heartbeat.  Btw, I still visit the infertility board (the one for parenting after infertility) on a regular basis.  I truly believe that unless someone has faced infertility, they have no clue how strong the urge is to have a baby and how tunnel-visioned we women can get with this whole process.  With all that money we are putting into it, it is still such a gamble and the odds, at least in my older woman stage, were against me.

The fact is that no one knows what causes DCIS.  No one knows which cases of DCIS may not even need to be treated.  It is natural to try to think of what we might have done to cause this just like we do when we have a miscarriage or when the cycle is negative, because at least then we feel that we have a sense of control when in actuality we really don't. 

Regarding the biopsy, I had to wait two days.  Waiting for the biopsy results, in my opinion, was the absolute most anxiety-provoking time during this entire process.  There was even a study done that showed that waiting for the biopsy results was the worst, because of the big unknown. At least when diagnosed with cancer, there is right away a treatment plan set forth. 

I hope you don't have DCIS and it is just benign calcifications.  But if it is DCIS, at least they are thinking it is confined to the ducts and there is no evidence of invasive cancer.  And, you can start reading up on DCIS and the treatment for, as you are doing now.  It is all about the matter of control.  Once you know exactly what you are dealing with, you can start making decisions regarding the treatment process and getting on to putting this matter behind you.