impatient and wondering how long from diagnosis to surgery?

i was diagnosed on july 25 th and had surgery on august 16 th. You can look up " surgery wait times in BC" on google to get an idea or call his office and ask the clerk. When i was diagnosed the doc told me it would be a couple of weeks.

Usually they don't know staging until after surgery. Do you think it might be grade 3?

Sorry you have to deal with this butnyou have found a great forum

oh well i hope they give you an answer on Tuesday. It can drive you nuts waiting and wondering what 's coming up. There is lots of information here and lots of different experiences. It really helped me to see how it was for other people although each of us has our own thing. Make sure you have all your questions ready for the doctor on tuesday. Good luck. This stuff is not fun but you are not alone.

lemonless, there is no standard rule on how long the wait is. Each case is different. First, depending on the pathology from the biopsy and the appearance of the cancer on the imaging, some cases are more urgent than others, and other cases are less urgent. This will factor into the scheduling. Another factor is whether there is any additional testing that the surgeon or oncologist want to have done before the surgery (in your case, for example, the second biopsy). A third factor is the availability of the surgeon. And if someone is having a mastectomy with reconstruction being done at the same time, it may take longer to coordinate the schedules of the breast surgeon and plastic surgeon, who would be operating together. Generally a wait of a month or so is pretty common, and many women go two months between diagnosis and surgery.

I agree with wrenn that Staging usually can't be done until after surgery. Have you had a biopsy of your lymph nodes? Stage III almost always means that you have positive nodes, so without your nodes being checked (which is usually done during surgery), I can't imagine a doctor knowing that you are Stage III. Staging simply can't be done from a breast tissue biopsy alone.

The two main factors that go into staging are the size of your tumour and whether or not you have positive lymph nodes (and the number of nodes affected). This is important because if it is estimated that you are Stage III with either a very large tumor and/or many positive nodes, sometimes it's recommended that chemo be done prior to surgery. This is a recommendation that would come from a medical oncologist. Often women don't see an oncologist until after surgery (the medical oncologist will be the doctor who recommends and coordinates any treatments you have beyond the surgery) but if you really are Stage III, then it would make sense to see a medical oncologist first. So the surgeon might refer you to an oncologist before setting a surgery date.

Do you have a copy of the pathology report from the biopsy? The important information there are the grade of the tumor, any comments that might be made about the estimated size of the tumour (the size would be estimated from the imaging), any comments pertaining to possible lymphovascular invasion, and the hormone status of the cancer (ER, PR and possibly HER2 although this often isn't done until surgery).

Good luck with the appointment on Tuesday. Let us know how it goes.

As usual Bessie nailed it. She is our go to person on this forum. She is so thorough and explains it so we can all understand. I echo her question about how the doctor already knows you are Stage III from the biopsy? I was IDC, Stage 1 until the path report came back following my lumpectomy. The report showed a micromet in the SN which changed my staging to Stage 2. Even my BS was surprised which is never a good thing. Even though it was very small and only found by dissecting and re-dissecting it was still a met. Fortunately for me my ONC ordered the Oncotype test and my score came back at 11 so I had 33 RADS treatments instead of chemo. I would certainly have a conversation with my doctor about his findings. Good luck. Keep us posted. Diane

I was diagnosed with grade 3 DCIS on September 13 and had a bilateral mastectomy with immediate reconstruction on October 17. I had 2 surgeon consults, first the breast surgeon and then the plastic surgeon. After those they coordinated their schedules and chose a date, I think it was about 3 weeks later. I am 10 days post surgery and I won't lie, it's not an easy recovery. My best advice is to allow others to wait on you. Even reaching for something is painful for the first few days. The drains are a pain, but necessary, and once those came out I felt a whole lot better. you will have good and bad days, and allow yourself to have both. I am 36 and usually very active. I'm tired of sitting on my butt, but I realize my body needs to heal. If you have kids, utilize them in your recovery too. My kids feel so much better about things when I allow them to help. It makes them feel good. I wish you the best with your consults and getting surgery scheduled. Let us know when you find out!

Rita

I was admitted after surgery and then went home the next morning. It felt so much better to be at home. I was doing great and because I have implants (less invasive then either flap procedures) she discharged me home. I followed up with her on the 23rd (6 days after surgery). She removed my drains that day. I was having around 10cc of fluid per day at that point. I hear it's not typical for them to be removed that soon though. Even my nurses at the hospital were saying the day after surgery that I wouldn't have them for long, I was having less then 30cc per day per side the day I came home. Everyone's experience is different though. I suggest you take it all into consideration and expect the worst but hope for the best. I was pleasantly surprised when I was able to have them removed so soon! I don't have as much experience as some on here but I'm happy to answer any questions that I can help with. After you see your surgeon and have a plan you will feel much better. I hated the unknown.

So what happened sweetie?