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Many women say the diagnosis of advanced breast cancer is often harder to deal with than the initial diagnosis.
You may experience fear, anguish, sadness, anxiety, or a sense of detachment. These are all normal and it is best to just "go with them" rather than to push them away or to deny them.
Many people advocate being positive and this is a good thing to do, but it is not always possible. If you are feeling sad, down or angry then feel these emotions, don't berate yourself for not being positive. It's hard to be positive when you have such a tough diagnosis to deal with. But if you can try to find the positive in life, the joy, the happiness ... then do so.
There are many different treatment programmes for women with advanced breast cancer. The kind of treatment you undergo will depend on the nature of the disease, but is likely to include at least one of the following:
POSNOC - POsitive Sentinel NOde: adjuvant therapy alone versus adjuvant therapy plus Clearance or axillary radiotherapy.
A randomised controlled trial of axillary treatment in women with early stage breast cancer who have metastases in one or two sentinel nodes.
The Breast Cancer Aotearoa Coalition (BCAC) is excited to partner with the Karen Louisa Foundation to better support New Zealanders with secondary breast cancer.
The Karen Louisa Foundation will donate $20,000 to BCAC over the next year as the organisation launches a special focus on women with secondary breast cancer.
BCAC chairperson, Libby Burgess, says the aim is to better support the hundreds of New Zealanders currently living with secondary breast cancer.
“A diagnosis of secondary breast cancer is a real body blow that leaves women reeling and stressed. We’re looking to provide peer support and knowledge to those who are newly diagnosed so that they can seek out good quality information and support as and when they need it,” Ms Burgess says.
A recent US study has highlighted the benefits of mindfulness and meditation for women diagnosed with breast cancer.
The research, published in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, examined a Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction for Breast Cancer programme using a randomised clinical trial in more than 300 women who had received recent treatment for breast cancer.
The researchers measured a number of physical and emotional health factors at the beginning of the study, such as depression, anxiety, stress and fear of recurrence.
They then split the women into two groups: one received usual care and the other group attended the six-week mindfulness programme.
Taking hormone drugs for more than ten years could help to dramatically reduce the risk of breast cancer recurrence, according to a landmark study.
A randomised clinical trial involving nearly 2,000 women found that cancer recurrence dropped by a third in those who took hormone drugs for ten years rather than the standard five.
Hormone therapy is given to the women with ER-positive breast cancer in order to stop the body from producing oestrogen, which helps to drive the growth of tumours in this type of breast cancer.
The study, which was presented to the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO), involved women who had already received hormone therapy for at least five years.
Researchers hope that three new breakthrough drugs designed to target triple negative breast cancer could potentially transform therapy for those with the hard-to-treat disease.
There are currently no targeted therapies for those with triple negative breast cancer leaving medical care reliant on traditional treatments such as chemotherapy and radiotherapy.
Now, the recent American Society for Clinical Oncology Annual Meeting has been told that new options are on the horizon that aim to target the triple-negative cancer cells directly.
A researcher involved with all three studies, Dr Jennifer Diamond of the University of Colorado Cancer Centre, says triple negative breast cancer is in need of a breakthrough treatment.
On these pages, we pay tribute to those with breast cancer who have passed away and to those who fight tirelessly to ensure women in New Zealand receive the best care and treatment possible for breast cancer.
The Breast Cancer Aotearoa Coalition (BCAC) wants to see a breakthrough new radiation technology used more widely to treat thousands of New Zealand women with breast cancer.
Intra-Operative Radiation Therapy (also known as IORT) is used in women with low-risk early-stage breast cancer and means they receive a single shot of radiation during surgery to remove the tumour.
The treatment can save women from having weeks of follow-up radiation treatment, but is currently only being used in a private hospital setting.
BCAC chairperson, Libby Burgess, says the charity would like to see women in the public system receiving the treatment.
