@Sarah,
I believe patients & doctors have been conditioned to think of DCIS as an indolent form of pre-cancer. This characterization could be the case for many patients.
However, this thinking lacks the personalization of analyzing each individual's cancer and is based on assumption instead of reality.
Back in 1999 - it would not have been acceptable practice to give a patient with DCIS the drug Herceptin. We can all look back and realize how prudent it would have been for you to receive trastuzumab. The thinking when the drug was being tested was that the higher the expression of Her2 receptors the more effective the drug would be. The focus was on those with Metastatic Breast Cancer - whose disease was so evident and situation was so dire. Your doctor would not have been able to act beyond Standard of Care without a clinical trial. Trials for DCIS and Herceptin in 1999? I suspect that did not exist.
Many young doctors can be very arrogant. Keep in mind that the deaths caused by the medical field is staggering:
Quote:
According to the most recent research1 into the cost of medical mistakes in terms of lives lost, 210,000 Americans are killed by preventable hospital errors each year.
When deaths related to diagnostic errors, errors of omission, and failure to follow guidelines are included, the number skyrockets to an estimated 440,000 preventable hospital deaths each year!
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You have the experience with DCIS and can sound the alarm to take it more seriously - an unfortunate expert, but others can benefit from you experience. Luckily for us - you are still here to share your story.
We need to be each other's advocates.
It is important to identify subtypes of cancer, and DCIS. Currently there is a large group of cancer patients which are being overtreated by chemotherapy (over 50%) and a small group that is being undertreated (small tumors & DCIS).