Breast Cancer Detection Video Transcript

Participants

, Seema A. Khan MD, Carol L. Kornmehl MD, FACRO

Summary

Advances in breast cancer treatment always spark a lot of interest. But equally important are new techniques for detection and diagnosis -- in most cases, early detection means a better chance of recovery.

Webcast Transcript

VAREN BLACK: I'm Varen Black, and welcome to our webcast. Breast cancer treatment has made great advances in recent years, but so have techniques for detecting the disease, which is equally important. Joining me to discuss the latest in breast cancer diagnosis is Dr. Seema Khan, who is an Associate Professor of Surgery at Northwestern University Medical School.

Dr. Khan, in a nutshell, briefly tell us, what are the risk factors associated with breast cancer?

SEEMA KHAN, MD: The most important risk factor for breast cancer is age. As age increases, so does breast cancer risk. Two thirds of breast cancer happens in women over 50 years of age. The other risk factors have to do with lifetime hormonal exposure, so women who start their periods early have an increased risk. Women who have their first child at a later age, over 30 or so, the risk is increased. With a late menopause, the risk increases also. If there are first-degree family members -- mother, sister, daughter -- who have been affected with breast cancer, that implies increased risk, and a history of prior benign biopsies also increases breast cancer risk.

And then there are lifestyle things like amount of alcohol use and body weight. Obese women, particularly after menopause, are at increased risk for breast cancer.

VAREN BLACK: Doctor, some women feel because they don't have a family history of breast cancer they don't need to be screened. That is not true?

SEEMA KHAN, MD: Correct. Most women who develop breast cancer, in fact, do not have a family history, so the absence of a family history does not mean that breast cancer will not happen, and screening is important for every woman in the right age group, in the age group over 40.

VAREN BLACK: What are some emerging diagnostic tools to further assess risk in high-risk women?

SEEMA KHAN, MD: Well, the diagnostic tool that's most established, obviously, is mammography, and there is a new twist on mammography, which is that instead of recording imaging information on film, as we've been used to doing for many decades, the image can be recorded digitally on a computer, and that's called digital mammography, and that offers some advantages, particularly for women with dense breasts that are hard to see through. So digital mammography is something that's actually over the horizon. It's available in many centers. It's available at Northwestern and many other places and is being evaluated in the general sort of community setting, as well.

Things that are available at more specialized centers and have not been evaluated to the same extent include magnetic resonance imaging, or MRI. As yet, MRI is not a screening tool, but it's very helpful in making diagnoses, particularly, again, in high-risk women with dense breasts, and also in establishing the extent of the cancer in a woman who has been diagnosed with breast cancer. That's an evolving technology that will probably impact the treatment as well as the diagnosis of breast cancer.

VAREN BLACK: Doctor, tell us about retrieving cells through the nipple.

SEEMA KHAN, MD: There are two emerging technologies that help to get cells directly from the ducts of the breast. The breast ducts are the tubes that carry the milk to the nipple from the lobules where the milk is made, and the breast ducts are probably the origin if breast cancer cells. That's where the cancers begin. Having access to cells from the breast ducts can be very helpful in a couple of different ways.