Is there benefit in surgery for stage iv's

[vonny]

laureen
were you on herceptin when the tumour grew back before surgery?
love
Yvonne

[laureen]

No I did not have herceptin until the end of treatment. I was not stage 4. I am not sure they even give people the course of chemo I was on anymore.

[vonny]

Thanks Laureen that really helps, of course we are hoping that Lorna keeps responding to treatment. I must admit that when chemo stopped all I kept thinking about was that the cancer would start growing again but with Lorna on Herceptin from the start it does help me in thinking that things are under control!
Love
Yvonne xx

[cheery]

I'm Stage IV with liver met since 2008 and have had bilateral mastectomy while having chemotherapy and Herceptin. It was a huge psychological benefit for me to remove the breasts, especially given the possibility of removing the breast cancer stem cells (some, if not all) from my body.

There has been a shift towards surgery for Stage IV in recent years to reduce the tumour load to improve long term survival, particularly for oligometastatic breast cancer.

Given your daughter's limited disease, she may likely fall into this oligomets group where the doctors treat the disease aggressively for curative purposes. This would include surgery to remove any tumours, in addition to chemotherapy and radiation therapy.

The link below is an online article on oligomestatic breast cancer treatment options to improve long term survival and quality of life.

http://jnci.oxfordjournals.org/content/102/7/456.full

Hope this helps.

Regards

Cat

[jacqueline1102]

Hello Vonny,

I am so sorry to hear about your daughter. In my case, Inflammatory breast cancer with one liver met albeit huge (4.6 cm) we did the trio of TCH for 6 rounds and because of my what they kept calling "significant response" surgery was conducted in March 2012. I went through radiation as well and continue on the hercepting and perjeta. I did not have any break during the surgery from my herceptin. The liver spot is now .6 mm. It's been exactly a year and my treatment team is pleased. I was informed that surgery became a go ahead because I was in good health, despite the cancer thing, and that my response to initial treatment was very good. I also pushed for it and brought in research that discusses how surgery helps prolong life with metastic breast cancer patients. The culture of medicine is changing around th surgery issue with stage IV women. In my case it was really good to have the surgery because coupled with the inflammatory breast cancer and the fact that my breasts were very dense, there were no indications of tumors underneath. The surgeon ended up removing a 1.5 cm tumor from my right breast. I am curious as if whether your daughter has dense breasts?

[vonny]

Oh Cat the word curative is such a lovely word isn’t it! Thank you for the link I will print it off and sit and digest it, think I will be a mind of information on breast cancer at the end of all this lol but joking aside the more info I can get the more I can help and support my beautiful girl…she is going to beat this!!
Jacqueline
Some of the research I have read up on does indeed point towards the fact that Lorna is young, healthy and only has one area where the cancer has spread. In my view she must be given the best possible chance of beating this disease and no stone can go unturned!
Lorna does not have inflammatory breast cancer, not sure with regards to dense breasts. I do know that they said she did have dense breasts because of her age (22) and that young women have dense breasts but don’t know if she would have dense breasts regardless of age.
We live in the UK and I know we can be a few years behind with the development of treatments for breast cancer but my way of thinking is I know the treatment is out there and if it means that I have to fight to get them for Lorna then that is just what I will do!!
Wishing you all continued good health with many more years to come.
Love
Yvonne xx