My Results

[sammiejoe]

Dear all, Hi again fron Greece. So i got my results back yesterday after 51 days of waiting. After 50 I had stored the mammograms in a safe place thinking surely by now that I had nothing to worry about. I was unfortunately wrong. My biopsy found two sites of DCIS both being 2 mm in size and progressive lymph node activity. My BS has told me my urgent next move is to have CAT Scan to check from the waist up if anything is happening anywhere else (i'm booked in for Monday morning) and then to have a sentinel node biopsy. He is happy that we appear to have found my cancer at early stage and told me that those are my next moves.. I have one question about this type of biopsy. Is it possible to have the dye injected after general anaes because I have a massive fear of needles? Also please tell me if my extreme fatigue that I have had for well over a year could be connected to the lymph node activity? Keeping positive knowing that according to BS we have found it early and look forward to hearing from you all.

[bluebutterfly2222]

Thanks for updating me on your treatment to date.

I am very glad to hear thet your lymph nodes were negative and the margins from you surgery were clear!

It may be that the additional calcifications showed up due to better resolution in the imaging equipment used more recently, or that new calcifications formed due to the biopsies, as can happen in response to biopsies and other surgeries.

Sorry you are having to go through another period of that DREADFUL waiting!

I'll be keeping you in my thoughts and prayers,
bb

[sammiejoe]

Hi again,now I'm writing from Athens. I have found myself a professor of mastology and he has now performed what appears to be (but I will clarify on Monday when I see him) a partial mastectomy. On having another mammogram in Athens at a better machine of that in Rhodes it was discovered that had an other 4 areas of curious clusters of microcalcifcations. These are spread over a very wide area thus me thinking we could probably call this procedure more than a lumpectomy. So now we are dealing with 6 suspicious areas or microcalcifications. We know that the first two areas brought back DCIS and Adenocaricinoma. Now I will wait 10 days for the results for the other 4 areas which have been removed in Athens. My sentinel node was clear from cancer cells and the large area which has now been removed was biopsed at the time of surgery and has clear boundaries. I now will attend a course of 30 days radiotherapy and hormone therapy ( they will stop my periods for 2 years). I just hope that the reason we did not find all of the calcifications in Rhodes is due to their machine being inferior from that of the one in Athens. I would like not to believe that my breast causes these calcifications every 60, what do you think?

[bluebutterfly2222]

p.s. I meant to say "if you have already had the two areas of DCIS removed..."

[bluebutterfly2222]

Hi again, sammiejoe,

I am sorry to hear this news came as a surprise, after thinking everything was okay!

As you probably know, to locate the sentinel nodes, a labeling substance, either radioactive tracer, blue dye, or both is injected into the area around the tumor before a mastectomy or lumpectomy is performed. The tracer travels the same path to the lymph nodes that the cancer cells would take, making it possible for the surgeon to determine the one or two nodes most likely to test positive for cancer by either visualizing the color or using a hand held Geiger counter.This method varies in how it is performed among hospitals and is still being tested to determine the best way to identify the positive nodes.

I can't tell from your question if you have already had the two areas of DCIS, or if you are going to have lumpectomies, to ensure clear margins, at the same time you have the Sentinel node biopsy. I'm also not clear on how your BS determined there is "progressive lumph node activity?"

In any case, your surgeon would be the one you'd have to ask, regarding whether the dye could be injected after general anesthesia is induced.

Also, there isn't any way someone over the Internet could hazard a guess as to the reason you have been experiencing such fatigue. Your own physicians, who have examined your and no doubt run bloodwork and possibly other tests, would be in a much better position to address that issue, although even they may not yet have an answer at this point.

Sorry not to be of more help!  But I did at least  want you to know that someone saw your question, cares about what you are going through, and will be keeping you in her thoughts and prayers.

Please let us know how the CAT scan turns out.

Best wishes...