6 of 8 lymph nodes w/cancer i Don't understand

[linn65]

I do not understand 6 of 8 lymph nodes and 6 have cancer? I read some have 19 of 20, or 17/25. If you have 30 nodes under your arm then why don't they say 6 of 30? Did they remove 8 and thought they were diseased and only 6 were?

[Pray]

Your correct linn. They took out a total of 8 lymph nodes and out of that 8 6 had cancer. In my case they took 12 and 4 had cancer. I'm praying radiation goes well for you. Gods blessings to you.

[roz123]

sounds like you had your sentinals removed and level 1 nodes. From my understanding everyone has a different number - I only had 2 sentinals, some people only have 1 other 4 etc... with 8 it sounds like they only did a SNB and level 1
if they were all positive they may have removed more...but since you are having radiation then that will take care of anything else

[NEDenise]

linn,
My onc explained it as...not everyone has the exact same number of axillary lymph nodes. It's apparently not too difficult to differentiate the cancer-y ones (sort of cauliflower-y in appearance) and the normal ones (much smoother), just by looking at them. Once they see some bad ones they take what they can see, plus some that look A-Okay.

My understanding is that there's no hard and fast rule for how many "bad" nodes can predict what will happen later as far as mets are concerned. But it seems to me - from what I've read around here - that fewer is better...usually. But we all know Her-2 cancer doesn't play fair! Stupid cancer!!

Hope some of that helps
Denise