[AlaskaAngel]

Magnified views as a standard for dense breasts is another very interesting bit of "thinking outside the box", and hopefully will be read and given serious consideration by those here who are part of the process of evaluating proposals for further study of breast cancer.

Markers are not reliable for everyone. They measure the level of disturbance in the body processes, but the measurement can be the result of other disturbances than the particular focus of interest, such as breast cancer. For example, if one has a different disease that triggers some of the same body responses as breast cancer does, the marker would show a change even though it might have nothing to do with breast cancer. It is possible that markers may even change in response to diet.

In addition, for some patients the ups and downs of the marker readings create a lot of anxiety. Doctors respond to this by either doing the markers but just being aware of them as one more possible indicator and not making the patient aware of the results for anxious patients, or else they may decide not to have the test run for the more anxious patient.

I wanted a baseline. I get the one used for ovarian cancer because of family history for that, as well as one of the markers used for breast cancer. At the end of chemo mine were at the top end of normal and within a year they dropped down to staying in the low to midrange of normal. Some get the CA 27.29, some get the CA 15-3, (which are considered more applicable to breast cancer) and some in addition get the CA-125 (which is for ovarian cancer), and some get the CEA, which is for general cancer and other cancers. The CEA can turn out to be helpful for some with breast cancer.

I tend to think mine have not bounced around because I have no other chronic diseases of any kind. I also try to eat a low-inflammatory diet, and get moderate exercise.