On the pulse...for people affected by breast cancer

Cancerkin News…

Hyde Park Walk update......

This year over £40,000 has been raised in donations and sponsorship for the Hyde Park Walk. The pictures for this year’s walk can be viewed on our Flickr and Facebook pages. If you have any pictures which you would like to share with us you can do so by uploading them onto our Facebook wall. Finally, please remember to send in your sponsorship money before 13th August and ensure that all cheques are made payable to Cancerkin.

La Bohème......

Cancerkin’s opera evening is next weekend and we still have tickets available! For more information or to order tickets please contact Lauren Newton on 020 7830 2323 or at l.newton@cancerkin.org.uk. All proceeds will go towards the creation of a Young Women’s Support Group at Cancerkin.

In the News…

Woman’s breast cancer diagnosis was wrong…

In 2007, a pathologist in Michigan found what was believed to be the earliest stage of breast cancer from a biopsy. The patient, Ms Long endured an extensive surgery, leaving her right breast missing a chunk the size of a golf ball.

In 2008 however, she was told that the pathologist had made a mistake as her new doctor was sure she never had the disease, called ductal carcinoma in situ (D.C.I.S), meaning the surgery, radiation, drugs and the fear had all been unnecessary. Miss Long, who is a registered nurse, told the New York Times that ‘”I never should have had to go through what I did”.

Like many women, Ms Long believed that a breast biopsy was the most reliable way to identify cancer. However, it turns out that diagnosing the earliest stage of breast cancer can be difficult.

Advances over the past 3 decades in mammography and other imaging techniques have meant that pathologists must form opinions on even the smallest breast lesions; some may even be the size of a grain of salt. According to some doctors deciphering the difference between lesions which are benign and early stage breast cancer is challenging.

According to Dr. Shahla Masood, who is the head of pathology at the University of Florida, College of Medicine, “There are studies that show that diagnosing these borderline breast lesions occasionally comes down to the flip of a coin.”

Dr Vi, who diagnosed Ms Long with DCIS was not board certified and has stated that he reads around 50 breast biopsies a year, far less than the leading pathologists say is needed in dealing with difficult breast cancer cases.

In response to a lawsuit brought by Ms. Long, Dr. Vi maintains that she had cancer and that two board-certified pathologists had agreed with his diagnosis.

However leading experts who reviewed Ms. Long’s case disagreed stating that her local pathologists “blew the diagnosis.”

Read more here.

African ancestry......

Researchers at the University of Michigan have found that African ancestry increases the chances of triple negative breast cancer, an overly aggressive form. A study of breast cancer in different ethnic groups showed that 82% of African women who had breast cancer had the triple negative variety as opposed to 26% in African Americans and only 16% in white Americans.

Triple negative cancer is negative for certain markers used in identifying suitable treatments. Most medical advances have come about using these markers and therefore the treatment options for triple negative breast cancer are limited. The researchers used 581 African Americans and 1008 white Americans in Detroit as well as 75 Ghanaians from the Komfo Anokye Teaching Hospital in Ghana. More on the story here.

Cancerkin Team

Friday 23rd July 2010