DCIS or Ductal Carcinoma In Situ is diagnosed in over 60,000 women in the United States alone annually. DCIS is defined as a growth of malignant cells located inside the milk ducts of a woman’s breasts. It is uncertain or at least there is a degree of controversy whether DCIS is a type of pre-cancer or the actual early stage of breast cancer.

The question with that uncertainty is that the method of treatment comes into play and how aggressive doctors should be in treating it. Should the treatments that are used for aggressive tumors or cancers be used on DCIS? Doctors and the patients must struggle with this issue and usually it comes down to the patient to decide. A leading obstetrician-gynecologist at Seattle’s Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, Susan Read, was quoted as saying that the medical profession is asking women to make decisions of life or death when it comes to DCIS without the facts to make these decisions.

DCIS diagnosis has grown rapidly since the early 70’s with the advent of mammograms for women. These breast cancer x-rays although often painful to women have succeeded in finding tumors too small to be discovered either by BSE’s or doctors exams. Most doctors do not take lightly putting their patients through the pain of such treatments as chemotherapy or radiation but they do not know enough about DCIS to determine if a small harmless tumor could suddenly turn lethal if left untreated. The result

Related Posts

• The Most Common Form of Breast Cancer
• The Most Invasive Common Breast Cancer
• Rare Forms of Breast Cancer
• What Is Medullary Carcinoma Of The Breast?
• What Is Mucinous Carcinoma Of The Breast?