Doing a self-examination for breast cancer can be daunting and awkward.  For many women it can also seem ineffective due to uncertainty of method or what they should be looking for. But by making self-examinations a routine activity in your life you can quickly overcome those worries and help monitor your health at the same time. Here is a quick guide to how to effectively perform a self breast examination.

Step 1) Observe

While there is much discussion over feeling for lumps, simple observation is a key towards knowing your body.  The presence of a lump is not the only indicator of breast cancer, making observation very important.

Stand in front of a mirror with your arms at your hips. Take a good look at the size, shape and color of your breasts. You want to check that the size is consistent with previous self-examinations.  Also look to see if your breasts are evenly shaped and show no signs of swelling. Visible signs of puckering, bulging or dimpling of any part of your skin in your chest area (including your armpits) are worthy of a call to your doctor.  Other notable breast exam findings are inverted nipples, rashes or redness.

Repeat this step with your arms up.

Step 2) Feel

You will do this step in two parts. One part you need to do lying down and the other is standing up.  The method is the same for both.

Use the hand on the opposite side of the breast you are examining. Using a small circular motion with the pads of your middle three fingers make your way across the entire breast.  The order and direction doesn’t matter, but you will want to stick to a pattern so you ensure that you don’t miss a spot. Make sure you cover the area from the top of your abdomen all the way to your collarbone.  Be sure to include your armpit and side of your body as well.  You may wish to turn over to your side when examining this part of your breast. After you finish with one breast, switch hands and move on to the other side.

TIP #1: Use three different pressure points.  You have multiple layers of tissue which require multiple uses of pressure when you examine your breasts. The lighter pressure will feel the top layers of tissue while the more firm pressure will reach the deepest tissues.

TIP #2: When standing up many women find it easier to do the examination when their body is wet.  Doing this step in the shower makes it easier and is a great use of your time!

TIP #3: Know what a lump would feel like.  There are already many natural “lumps” within the breast tissue.  Milk glands, lymph nodes and the tissue itself feel like squishy lumps that you can move around. A tumor (benign or cancerous) would be hard and immovable.

Performing a self-exam should be a regular occurrence in your health regime. It is important to know the anatomy of your own breasts. Knowing what they look like and feel like will give you sufficient guidelines to compare future examinations too. Finding something new can’t happen if you don’t know what is normal for your body! Breast cancer is a highly treatable disease when discovered early. Knowing your body to the point that you can notice even small changes can give you that vital jump on protecting your future.

This is a guest post from Breana Orland. She is a writer for Student Grants. Breana also gives advice on the pursuit of higher education and career options for young adults. If you wish to submit your guest post in Cytogenetics Cancer Research blog, please follow this guideline.

How to Check Yourself for Breast Cancer is a post from: Cytogenetics and Cancer Research

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MCF-7 cell line was first derived from a pleural effusion of a post menopausal 69 years patient with metastatic breast cancer in 1970 (Rebecca et. al., 2003). The MCF-7 cell line is the most widely used and best characterized of all the human breast cancer cell lines (Dino et. al., 2007).

I have described to you about cancer cell lines in my previous post HepG2 Cell Line. You may read through it to get the idea of cancer cell lines.

MCF-7 – Breast Cancer Cell Line

MCF-7 cell line is the first hormone-responsive breast cancer cell line (Amanda et. al., 2003).  It also has differential sensitivities to estrogens and anti-estrogens, differential expression of estrogens receptor (ER), ER mRNA, and progesterone receptor, and differences in tumorigenicity and proliferation rates (Matthew et. al., 2003). Clinical studies have shown that therapeutic agents preventing the synthesis and activity of estrogens are essential in the breast cancer treatment. The addition of extradiol which is one of the fractions of estrogen to the medium of MCF-7 cells induces a proliferative response (Irene et. al., 2003). The characteristics of MCF-7 cells like the estradiol-dependence for growth and low metastatic potential has led to the assumption that they represent an early epithelial adenocarcinoma of breast (John et. al., 1995).

MCF-7 cell line are perfect model to study the pathway of malignant progression as they can be subjected to appropriate endocrinologic and physiologic selective pressures for the derivation of variants with more progressed phenotypes (Hans et. al., 2007).

It has been shown to possess the ability to go through DNA fragmentation. There are apoptotic responses of MCF-7 cell line to the apoptosis-inducing agents like tumour necrosis factor and anti-Fas antibody. The MCF-7 cells are also an excellent in vitro model for studying the mechanisms of chemo-resistance because of its susceptibility to apoptosis (Richard et. al., 2003).

In conclusion, MCF-7 cell line is another useful cell line that can be used in various cancer research especially in breast cancer research. I also used it in my final year project.

This is a part of literature review of my final year project thesis. I wish to share with you all what i have done.

MCF-7 Cell Line is a post from: Cytogenetics and Cancer Research

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Tamoxifen plays an essential role as adjuvant drug in breast cancer treatment. Many people do not know about the mechanism how it functions to prevent the progression of breast cancer. I have found a lot of information about the Tamoxifen to share with all of you.
 

Tamoxifen is Effective to Treat Breast Cancer

As what we know, Tamoxifen works to occupy the estrogen receptor and blocks the estrogen. In fact, there is another mode of action to treat the breast cancer instead of just blocking the estrogen. It also works in estrogen-receptor negative breast cancer and progesterone-receptor positive breast cancer. Instead of just blocking the estrogen, it also blocks another type of signal known as Protein Kinase C (PKC). PKC is essential in regulation of activation of oncogenes. By blocking the PKC, the oncogenes will not be activated. Besides, PKC also regulates other signals that control the growth and transformation of cells.
 

Furthermore, Tamoxifen is able to interfere with the cell cycle too. This is another anti-cancer action of it. As we all know, cell cycle is a predetermined program that leading the cell goes through the division. Normally, the cell cycle will be stopped at the checkpoints to ensure everything is in normal condition. The checks will ensure that the abnormal cells do not replicate. However, the cancer cells have abnormal cell cycles where they lost those checkpoints. Therefore, the cancer cells can replicate without any barrier. Consequently, the traditional chemotherapy is to restore the checkpoint function in cancer cell to stop the cell cycle. Significantly, Tamoxifen is one of the good drugs to be used as chemotherapeutic agent as it can stop the cell cycle in cancer cells.
 
In the previous post about the hormonal therapy for breast cancer treatment, I have mentioned that Tamoxifen can only work at 2 years. After 2 years, the drug will start to enhance the developing of tamoxifen-dependent cancer. We called this problem as Tamoxifen Resistance. Many cancer researches show that Tamoxifen Resistance is because of the permanent damage caused by the drug. It might damage the tumour suppressor gene, p53. p53 is a main role to stop the cell cycle and prevent the cancer cells to replicate. According to cancer research, p53 regulates the cell cycle when there are abnormal cells and cause them to apoptosis. Tamoxifen may stop p53 from working.
 
In conclusion, Tamoxifen is an effective drug to regulate the development of breast cancer only with the appropriate used. We need to get the advices from the oncologist before consuming it.

Tamoxifen – Breast Cancer Treatment is a post from: Cytogenetics and Cancer Research

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Breast cancer is a troublesome disease. There are many reasons that causing breast cancer. It has been clear that the hormone is one of the key factors of the development of breast cancer. Therefore, hormonal therapy is an important therapeutic strategy to control this cancer.

Hormonal Therapy to Control Estrogen Level

There are many cancer research on the removed tumours showing that the breast cancer is estrogen-receptor positive. Theoretically, this type of cancer should show response to hormonal therapy on estrogen. To manipulate the estrogen level in the body, the Tamoxifen has been introduced to the world.

Hormonal Therapy Using Tamoxifen

Tamoxifen is an adjuvant drug or antagonist of estrogen receptor in breast cancer cell. It helps in hormonal therapy to treat the breast cancer. However, several studies show that Tamoxifen may cause an increase of estrogen in the blood after 2 years hormonal therapy. This is because the breast cancer cells may become resistant to Tamoxifen hormonal therapy. Besides, the estrogen-receptor positive cells may easily mutate into new cancer cell type that can proliferate without the presence of estrogen. Thus, Tamoxifen fails to control cell proliferation after 2 years of hormonal therapy.

Despite of this, the Tamoxifen hormonal therapy is suggested not to use beyond a two year period. Tamoxifen may cause serious side effects after 2 years. It can increase risk of abnormal blood clots too. The patients with Tamoxifen hormonal therapy must follow the Thrombosis Prevention protocol to minimize the risk of deep vein thrombosis.

While taking Tamoxifen, women are recommended to take 4000 to 6000 IU of vitamin D3 and 3 to 50 mg of melatonin nightly. There are many clinical trials show that melatonin and vitamin D3 significantly enhance the efficiency of Tamoxifen. However, another side effect of taking vitamin D3 needs to be paid attention. Breast cancer patients may experience a high risk for developing blood calcium disorders causing kidney toxicity and abnormal calcium metabolism if taking high doses of vitamin D3. For all these reason, breast cancer patients who use therapeutic doses of vitamin D3 should carry out a regular blood chemistry panel to monitor the kidney toxicity and calcium imbalances before the problems become worse.

In conclusion, hormonal therapy is a great way to control the progression of breast cancer though it brings many side effects. I will talk more about the Tamoxifen in my coming post especially the aspects we really need to know before using it.

Hormonal Therapy to Treat Breast Cancer is a post from: Cytogenetics and Cancer Research

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Breast cancer is the fear of any woman in the world. It is not difficult to know that either a friend or a relative who has or had breast cancer. It has been the leading cause of death for women between the ages of 35 and 54. However, did every woman know the things before treatment of breast cancer? Thus, today’s post is all about the things to know before breast cancer treatment to help women understand about these.
 

As we all know, all types of cancer cell can spread to the whole body from the origin. Most of the time, when the cancer has been detected the chance that the disease has spread is high. Once a lump has been detected on the breast, there may already be an average of 45 billion cancer cells present, and some of them have been metastasized to other parts of the body. Thus, the early detection of breast cancer is important to prevent the cancer cells from spreading. I have been covered the Early Detection of Breast Cancer in my previous post.
 
Conventional medicine divides the stages of the breast cancer based on certain factors like tumour size, lymph node involvement, or distal spread. According to the stage of the cancer, the oncologist may suggest many options or even combinations from simple lumpectomy (breast-conserving surgery) to complete mastectomy (removal of one or both breast), radiation, and chemotherapy.
 
Yet, not all the therapies are suitable for a particular patient. Usually, the oncologist will design the most suitable treatment to the patient. The use of radiation and chemotherapy will certainly weaken the immune system of the cancer patient. This leaves the cancer patient more vulnerable to the development of metastatic lesions in many of our body organs. Though, there are many successful cases that using the radiation and chemotherapy to improve the survival of breast cancer patients with appropriately dose.
 
The oncologist will only give the best recommendations to the breast cancer patient according to the stages of the disease. The patient needs to make informed decisions whether which therapies to utilize. Therefore, the final decision is on the patient’s hand.
 
In conclusion, we need to know a little bit about the breast cancer so that we will not panic when facing on this disease especially for the women. This is only an introduction of breast cancer treatment. I will cover the details in my future post in Cytogenetics and Cancer Research blog.

Things to Know Before Breast Cancer Treatment is a post from: Cytogenetics and Cancer Research

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Prevention of breast cancer is always the fundamental thing to look on in cancer research instead of finding a way for treatment. Most of the practices on breast cancer prevention are only for women with moderate to high breast cancer risk. There are still no guidelines for the prevention of breast cancer for women with average risk. However, how can we identify the group of women at known risk in general population? Thus, it is important for us to know whether we are in risk of breast cancer by knowing the risk factors and do the early detection steps frequently.
 

Breast Cancer Prevention in General

Generally, we can do some prevention steps in our daily life no matter we are in risk or not. Leading a healthy lifestyle is an essential prevention step for all the cancer.
 
1. It is advised that women need to maintain a healthy body weight throughout their daily life without consuming high fat food.
 
2. Women have to do some regular physical activities such as jogging, swimming and so on.
 
3. Breastfeeding is a good practice to prevent the breast cancer.
 
4. Consume diets that rich in grains, fruits and vegetables. Less meat in diet will be too good to be practiced.
 
5. Moderate use of alcoholic beverages. It is too good not to consume the alcoholic beverages at all.
 
6. Minimize yourself from the exposure to exogenous hormones.
 
7. Reduce the sugars in the diet.
 

Breast Cancer Prevention for Women with Moderate to High Risk

There are several ways for the prevention of breast cancer in women at significantly increased risk. Who are those with moderate to high risk in breast cancer?
 
1. Women who are the carriers of BRCA1/BRCA2 mutation.
 
2. Women with multiple affected relative breast cancer presenting at early age.
 
3. Women with family history of breast cancer and so on.
 
There are many options for the women in risk to prevent from breast cancer. Most of the strategies are to remove the tissue which may become cancerous and decrease the endogenous hormone exposure. The most common are bilateral prophylactic mastectomy and bilateral salpingo-oophorectomy. These two methods are considered highly effective for risk reduction. Both methods are the choices for BRCA mutation carriers. To really reduce the breast cancer risk, the BRCA carriers are recommended to undergo Bilateral Salpingo-oophorectomy by age 35-40 years or after childbearing is completed.
 
In conclusion, it is important for us to recognize the group of women with high risk or moderate risk who will ultimately develop breast cancers. There are many risk assessment can be done through the cancer research. This will reduce the need for many women to unnecessarily undergo aggressive surgery.
 

Prevention is better than cure. Assess your unknown breast cancer risk now!

Prevention of Breast Cancer is a post from: Cytogenetics and Cancer Research

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After introducing the basic knowledge about the breast cancer and some of the risk factors which included our lifestyle and environmental factors, I wish to share about the prevention of breast cancer. I think this is the most important part in this breast cancer series. We have to take action to against the breast cancer!
 

Early Detection

Just like others malignant cancer, early detection of breast tumors are more treatable. When the smaller tumors are detected earlier, a more favourable and details prognosis can be done. This action reserves as the primary defence for all the women, especially for those who are 40 years old and above. There are many recommended methods to use for early detection.
 

Breast Self Exam (BSE)

Monthly breast self exam is the most inexpensive way for regular examination of breast. Although the effectiveness of this method still under questioned by some of the medical experts, the breast self exam are still considered promising and safe method of early detection, particularly for women younger than 40 who still not wish to run the screening.
 

Clinical Breast Exam (CBE)

Clinical breast exam is another less expensive way for regular examination. However, the effectiveness of CBE is still controversial although it is better than BSE. For women at low risk, doing CBE annually still can help to prevent from breast cancer.
 

Mammography

For women at average risk, I will suggest you to do the mammography. It is an effective way for prevention of breast cancer. This is the most public friendly method to detect early stage of breast cancer when still treatable. Sometimes, people will use the result of CBE combining with mammography to increase the screening reliability. However, mammography may be less effective for younger women. The mammography can detect the tumors much earlier than CBE and almost 2 years before detected by BSE. Although mammography is introduced to the public in some modern countries since 30 years ago, there are still a minority of women community do not undergo the screening in those countries. This case happens among the poor people who are unaffordable to pay for it. In addition, there are still a lot of countries that lack of this detection tool.
 

Improved Mammography

There are many effective approaches to enhance the sensitivity and specificity of mammography for breast cancer screening.

1. Digital mammography

• Improved detection rates for younger women and women with denser breasts.

2. Screen film mammography

• Higher sensitivity for women whose breast images are difficult to interpret.

3. Ultrasound

• Used to assist CBE to detect mammogram.
• Fail to detect mocrocalcification and poor specificity.

4. Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI)

• Detecting breast cancer for women at high risk and in younger women.
• Highly sensitive after combining with mammogram and CBE.
• Essential screening tool for women with BRCA1 or BRCA2 mutations to identify early cancer.
• Very expensive and poor specificity. Only recommended to high risk women.

 
In conclusion, earlier detection and treatment both contribute to the prevention of breast cancer. Please do not hesitate to do the earlier detection steps, at least doing BSE monthly to prevent from the developing of breast cancer cell in our body.
 

Have you doing the breast cancer screening before? Come and share with us.

Early Detection to Prevent Breast Cancer is a post from: Cytogenetics and Cancer Research

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Lifestyle and Environmental Risk Factors

In my last post about 5 major breast cancer risk factors, I have mentioned that the lifestyle is also an important contributor to the breast cancer. Therefore, I will introduce to you another 2 most high recognized risk factors of breast cancer in cancer research.

Lifestyle is Essential

I will start off by talking about the lifestyle. According to the cancer research, the breast cancer incidence around the world is largely attributed to differences in dietary intake and reproductive behaviour.

Some of the dietary intake can be the protective against breast cancer.

a) Diets with enriched grains, fruits and vegetables

b) Diets with low saturated fats

c) Diets with low calories

d) Diets without alcohol

As we all know, most of the breast cancer occur during the postmenopausal period. There are many reasons associated with this statement. According to cancer research, diets with high energy content in the form of animal fats and refined carbohydrates may cause the adult weight gain and consequently induce breast cancer. Another reason is the usual sedentary lifestyle among the postmenopausal community. These kinds of lifestyle certainly will cause the obesity. There is evidence saying that high fat and energy diets intake without any exercise may contribute to the development of breast cancer. However, we should not start to look after our lifestyle just when postmenopausal period. We should serve the healthy lifestyle as the basis to reduce the breast cancer start from child hood.

Environmental Exposures

Next, we will continue to discuss about the environmental risk factors. Some of the environmental exposures might harm us to induce breast cancer, there are:

a) Tobacco smoke (direct or indirect exposure)

b) Dietary (charred and processed meats)

c) Carcinogens

The ionizing irradiation is associated to the breast cancer. The high doses of ionizing irradiation will increased the risk of cancer if the chest area is exposure during puberty. If you had been exposed to the irradiation exposure before this especially to the chest area, you are advised to do the examination. The risk increases to nearly 20-fold for women treated during their adolescence.  Tobacco and alcohol consuming is totally prohibited from our life if we really wish to get rid of breast cancer. However, there is still o evidence support to the significant link between other environmental exposures and breast cancer risk.

Thus, we can change the destiny if we really aware to our lifestyle and environment exposures to get rid of breast cancer. Living healthy, free from cancer!

Have you change your lifestyle to the healthy mode? Make a difference today!

Breast Cancer Series: Lifestyle and Environmental Risk Factors is a post from: Cytogenetics and Cancer Research

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Findings of Cancer Research

According to cancer research, breast cancer is the most commonly cancer diagnosed in the world. I have mention it in my Cytogenetics and Cancer Research blog. Are you in the risk of breast cancer? After knowing the basis of breast cancer, we have to know what the risk factors of breast cancer are. With the findings of cancer research, there are 5 major risk factors of breast cancer.

5 Major Risk Factors of Breast Cancer

Breast Cancer Risk Factor I: Age and Gender

Is the breast cancer can be linked to the age and gender? Yes! The females have higher possibility to get the breast cancer than the male. The male breast cancer case is very rare to occur. At the same time, cancer research shows that sporadic breast cancer is relatively rare among women who are younger than 40 years old. However, women who are 40 years old above will significantly sustain with much higher possibility of breast cancer. The highest breast cancer incidence rate is between 50 to 69 years old. After 70, the incidence rate of breast cancer is decline. If you are surrounding menopause period, I will highly recommend you to go for body check frequently, especially for mammography screening. There is a significant increase of breast cancer incidence rate during the years before and after menopause. Sincerely, it is better to do the checking annually regarding the age just for your own good. Below is the guidelines that we can follow；

Breast Cancer Risk Factor II: Family History

If one of your relative with breast cancer, is it possible for you to be the carrier too? This is the common question might be asked by most of the people. Unfortunately, a positive family history of breast cancer is the most widely recognized risk factor for breast cancer, especially for the closest relative according to cancer research. Breast cancer exhibits high penetrance among the hereditary cancers. If you are suspected to be at risk for hereditary forms of breast cancer, you are advised to seek expert genetic counsellor to deal with it. There are many genetic tests can be done to confirm the degree of risk. For further information about the genetic counselling centre in your area, you may go to http://www.cancer.gov/search/geneticsservices/ to check avaibility.

Breast Cancer Risk Factor III: Reproductive

If you experienced natural menopause after 55 years old, you are twice time risky compare to others in term of breast cancer. Women with early menarche before 12 years old also sustain higher risk of breast cancer. Early menarche results in early onset of regular ovulatory menstrual cycles. Consequently, the girl might in an extended exposure to reproductive hormones. It is good to avoid from having a late pregnancy. Cancer research shows that women who have their first child only after 30 will in higher risk. However, breastfeeding is a good behaviour to reduce the risk of breast cancer.

Breast Cancer Risk Factor IV: Endogenous Hormone Exposures

Exposure of sex hormones, most properly extradiol (E2) in a long run will cause the developing of breast cancer. Many of recent cancer researches support an elevated risk among women with high E2 levels.

Breast Cancer Risk Factor V: Exogenous Hormone Exposures

The use of Oral Contraceptive (OC) has been a controversial issue that associate with the risk of breast cancer. The use of OC conferred a small increase in risk of breast cancer. The risk appears to decrease with age and time with OC discontinuation. However, OC consuming significantly reduce the risk of ovarian cancers. Another possible exogenous hormone exposure is Hormone Replacement Therapy (HRT). HRT is used for the prevention of chronic disease for long-term use. This application might cause the increase of risk of breast cancer. Therefore, for patient that suffering severe menopausal symptoms have to deal with the significant challenge that related to the risk of breast cancer.

In conclusion, these are the risk factors that we need to pay attention. Although i’m not mention in this article, unhealthy life style also plays a role in contributing to the development of breast cancer accoding to cancer research. Live healthy with high awareness!

Are you feeling worry on your health status? Go and check for it!

Breast Cancer Series: Are You Risky?! is a post from: Cytogenetics and Cancer Research

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I have covered some of the basic knowledge about cancer in Cytogenetics and Cancer Research including the introduction of cancer research, types of cancer diseases, types of treatment and how the cancer cell spread according to cancer research in my previous post. I think it is the suitable time for me to start write something much more interesting and specifically to certain cancer disease in cancer research.  I’m not really enjoyed writing in the theoretical article like the previous one actually. It is quite bore to read on. Inspiring with the month of Breast Cancer Awareness, I decide to write a series about breast cancer research. I will start off with some information on breast cancer research in this post. By then, do you know any risk factors that we need to pay attention to? Any prevention step to deal with it? All of these will be covered in my breast cancer research series.

Firstly, we have to know what the breast cancer exactly is. According to the current cancer research about the breast cancer, we can describe that it is an invasive cancers arise through a series of molecular alterations that occur at the cell level, and consequently causing the uncontrollable growth and spread of breast epithelial cells. Breast cancer is the most commonly diagnosed cancer in most of the countries. Early detection and the recent more effective therapies had led to significant reductions in breast cancer related deaths. However, breast cancer remains a major cause of death. Some of the authorities start to worry about the increasing rates of breast cancer worldwide especially among previously low-risk regions and low-risk populations. This is a particularly worrisome trend as most of these regions are limited with the access of screening and effective therapies. Therefore, prevention of invasive breast cancer remains a major global public health priority.

Like most of the other cancers, once breast cancer has been detected there is already the chance that the disease has spread to adjacent cells. Conventional medicine stages the disease based on certain factors like tumor size, involvement of lymph node or distal spread. The suggested treatment depends on the stages of the breast cancer.

Symptoms of Breast Cancer

There are many signs and symptoms of breast cancer. It is important that women to be aware of the breast cancer signs.

a) Lumps or thickening in the breast or armpit area

b) Changes in the skin in the breast or armpit area, e.g. dimpling, redness or puckering.

c) Changes in nipple, e.g. a change in the direction or an unusual discharge

d) Changes around the nipple, e.g. an unusual rash or sore area.

e) Changes to the shape and size of the breast

f) Unusual pain or discomfort

If someone discovered that he or she has such symptoms, the person should report to the doctor for further diagnosis. Although it is very rare for men to have breast cancer, there is still possible to occur. Thus, be aware to these kinds of symptoms always. Cancer research on breast cancer is still going on to look through more treatment that can be used.

Don’t you know that breast cancer is the most commonly cancer diagnosed according to cancer research? Did you and your beloved go for body checking frequently?

Breast Cancer Series: Introduction of Breast Cancer is a post from: Cytogenetics and Cancer Research

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