All Your Breast Cancer Questions: Answered
No matter how many health headlines you've read, chances are you still have unanswered questions about breast cancer. These readers sure did—and we can learn all about breast cancer from the answers here.
Q: Let's say I find a breast lump. What are the chances of it being cancer?—Jennifer Staib, Allentown, PA
A: Not very high, you'll be happy to know. "If you're premenopausal, most lumps are benign and caused by hormonal fluctuations—so the chance it's cancerous is only about 10 percent," says Susan Love, M.D., professor of surgery at the University of California, Los Angeles, and president of the Dr. Susan Love Research Foundation. After menopause, however, hormones stabilize and the odds of a mass being a true abnormality are much greater: "If you find a lump then, it's about 50-50 that it's cancer," Love says. No matter what the odds, though, the experts we spoke to said women of all ages should get any lump checked by a doctor.
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Q: Does social drinking (say, having several drinks every weekend) really raise my risk?—Joyce Hanz, Pittsburgh
A: A lot of open questions remain about alcohol and breast cancer, including why drinking would encourage cancer growth, but the increased risks do appear to be real. One major study, for example, suggests that consuming two drinks a day over a seven-year period boosts risk of certain types of breast cancer by 34 percent. So if you drink, experts advise keeping it to an average of one or fewer drinks per day. "But if you're drinking moderately and have a couple of margaritas one night when you haven't had much the rest of the week, that fits in with what we think is reasonable," Bevers says.
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Q: How do you tell the difference between "suspicious" lumps and "miscellaneous" lumps? What does cancer feel like?—Kathy Harris, Shaker Heights, OH
A: Benign cysts — fluid-filled sacs that can swell and shrink with your menstrual cycle—may feel squishy. Fibroadenomas, another common benign lump, are usually small, round or oval, and hard, like marbles. (Women with fibrocystic breasts may have many of these lumps.) But the way cancer feels varies a lot, says Therese Bevers, M.D., medical director of the Cancer Prevention Center at the University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Center in Houston. It can be hard and knotty (like tiny pieces of coral), feel like a pea or a series of pealike nodules, or feel more like a vague mass that's a different texture from the rest of your tissue. Inflammatory breast cancer may not be a lump at all and can look more like a skin rash or an infected bite. "I never had a lump," says Jenna Glazer, director of development for the Young Survival Coalition, who had a rare form of breast cancer called Paget's disease. "My main symptom was more like dryness on the nipple, which didn't seem normal to me." Other possible cancer signs include skin dimpling, a retracted nipple, or discharge. "If you notice any change, you need to contact your doctor," Bevers says. "The fact that it looks different or feels different is more important than exactly how a lump is shaped."
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Q: I've heard that a blow to the breast can lead to cancer. True?—Holland Utley, Yonkers, NY
A: No, injury to the breast hasn't been linked to cancer, Bevers says. But it can produce hardened areas of tissue that may look and feel alarming to you. Remember, it's smart to get any and every lump checked.
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Q: If I'm over 40 and taking birth control pills, do I run a greater risk of breast cancer?—Leslie Levine, Montclair, NJ
A: No matter what your age, exposure to reproductive hormones such as estrogen (especially combined with progestin, like in most birth control pills) does slightly increase your risk of breast cancer. "These risks are very small when you're young and most likely to be on birth control," Bevers says. In women over 40, as breast cancer risks in general begin to rise, being on the Pill might boost the average 12 percent lifetime risk of getting breast cancer to around 15 percent—but this added risk disappears about five years after quitting hormonal contraception. "The risks have to be balanced against the benefits you get from the Pill, but after 40, you might consider alternative methods of birth control, such as a nonhormonal IUD, or your partner getting a vasectomy," Bevers says.
See more questions and answers about breast cancer at Redbookmag.com.
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