Removing the breast

Aaron, I'm sorry about your Mother's diagnosis, but glad she's doing well with her chemo regimen. As far as which surgery to do, although a breast surgeon may assure a woman that a lumpectomy would be adequate surgery for her situation, the final choice is usually left up to the patient. The one thing I would urge you to do is to be sure your Mother's medical team is experienced with IBC, which is not a common bc. How it's handled initially -- including surgery -- may make a significant difference in outcome, and your Mother wants a surgeon who has dealt with many cases of it, which you probably won't find outside of the major medical centers listed here -- assuming you're in the US. http://www.cancer.gov/research/nci-role/cancer-cen...

You might also want to ask your question within the IBC Forum here because the women who post there will have firsthand experience to share. Here's a link:https://community.breastcancer.org/forum/81

Good luck. Your Mother will be in my thoughts & prayers! She's very fortunate to have you advocating for her, helping her make wise decisions! Deanna

Aaron, unlike radiation, the decision re. the need for chemo is not dependant on whether a woman has a lumpectomy or a mastectomy, but on other things such as the type of bc, size and grade of the lesion, if it's gone into any lymph nodes, and specific factors regarding its aggressiveness. In many instances w/neo-adjuvant chemo, you are finished with it prior to surgery. Has anyone told your Mother that she will need additional chemo after a lumpectomy?

The need for radiation, OTOH, is somewhat related to the choice of surgeries. Those who have an mx can sometimes (not always) avoid RT vs. those who have an lx and need it as further assurance any possible remaining bc cells will not regenerate in or around the original tumor site. But even some (like me) who have had an mx sometimes need RT due to specific concerns, such as a close margin.

Hope this helps. Happy to answer any additional questions you or your Mother might have. Deanna

Chemo is systemic treatment; radiation and surgery are local. That is to say, the purpose of chemo is to destroy cancer cells that are floating around in the blood stream and lymph system, looking for a new home. Surgery and radiation just take out the cancer in the breast and/or nodes themselves. They have no impact on the cancer cells that have broken off from the tumor and are floating around in the rest of the body.

There is one more systemic treatment: hormonal therapy, which seeks to deprive ER+ cancer of the estrogen that feeds it. Obviously, oncologists will only prescribe hormonal therapy if the patient is ER+.

You haven't given us your Mom's data: size of tumor, grade, ER/PR status, or whether or not she is HER 2+. Also, it's not clear whether or not your oncologist is relying on the Oncotype test in determining whether or not chemo will be helpful to her. Hence, we can't say whether or not your oncologist's plan is typical or not for your mother's diagnosis.

Best wishes!

It is impossible for ANYONE to tell you what your 'Mother's' TX might be.

It is almost NEvER that anyone is Stage II when DXd with Inflammatory Breast Cancer! IBC is rare (only between 1% - 5% of all DXd types of BCl.

What country are you in?

There are MANY meds that legitimate Drs prescribe to manage nauseau!