Metaplastic Breast Cancer

Cyberknife Treatment for cancer

Last week my friend Alexandra was over.  She came to Germany to Frankfurt for Cyberknife treatment.  Unlike chemo, Cyberknife has about a 90% success rate.  It is also fast and does not give anyone huge side effects. 

Cyberknife is radiation treatment - better known as Radio surgery.  The robot delivers radiation to specific areas often very small sections about 3-4mm.  It is non-invasive.  

In my opinion it is the real way to treat any metastatic cancer in the lungs or brain. 

Here are a few pictures. 

Above is the machine.  That is used for the procedure. 

Below is Alexandra strapped to the bed before the treatment. 

This last image is of the mask that you must wear during Cyberknife.

 

Just to show everyone how wonderful this is this a picture of Alexandra 2 days after treatment.  Her treatment lasted 1.5 hours and there were no side effects. 

Stopping Sugar day 7 to 14 - you talking to me?

Stopping Sugar day 7 to 14 – “you talking to me?”

 

Stopping Sugar day 7 to 14 … is the safe title … I wanted to call this “thinking of murder” but I thought I might scare somebody! 

I am finally starting to feel normal again.  Week 2 or day 7 to 14 of no sugar was terrible.  Here is my diary.

 

Immunohistochemical study of metaplastic breast cancer

Just in! New research on metaplastic breast cancer an immunohistochemical study.

 

I was delighted to see this pop up just now on my news feed.   Finally some analysis on MBC and how it does target younger women.  The mean of this group is 36 and I was 36 when first diagnosed. 

No sugar - start sweating

No sugar -  start sweating quick update on my no sugar diet

OH My Gosh.

 

I am now on 10 of my no sugar diet.  The first week I didn't do too much sport as I had all sorts of headaches and other problems.   This week I have been keeping myself busy. 

Bristol-Myers Squibb NCT01928394 Can you Help Patricia?

Bristol Myers Squibb sponsors a study A Phase 1/2, Open-label Study of Nivolumab Monotherapy or Nivolumab Combined With Ipilimumab in Subjects With Advanced or Metastatic Solid Tumors

Can you help Patricia?

She is a 60 year old cancer patient currently at MDA.  Here is a little bit about her:

Foundation One Study on Metaplastic Breast Cancer

Foundation One has written an excellent study on Metaplastic Breast Caner and Genomic Profiling.

The exact title is a bit of a mouthful but here goes:  Comprehensive Genomic Profiling of Metaplastic Breast Carcinoma By Next Generation Sequencing Reveals Frequent Actionable Genomic Abnormalities and New Routes to Targeted Therapies

Histological subtypes of TNBC including Metaplastic Breast Cancer from ASCO 2014

Metaplastic breast cancer MBC is a histological subtype of TNBC - Triple Negative Breast Cancer.  This short abstract supports the previous article saying that MBC is rare - but not that rare!  This is music to my ears.

 

Out of a group of 502 patients 4% were metaplastic.  That is an increase, as we have seen figures, where on average MBC was 1% of TNBC and 0.01% of all breast cancers.  Increased awareness of MBC is starting to show.   I realise this is a small study but still a positive one...it mentions MBC!!

P13K gene alterations are common in Metaplastic Breast Cancers - ASCO Conference

This is another fantastic article from the ASCO Conference

I love the fact they provide abstracts of the notes for patients and other interested people like us (Thank-You!).

This is a great evaluation of 126 cases of Metaplastic Breast Cancer (MBC) and gene mutations.

I love this quote from the abstract: "The low RRM1 expression rate suggests possible gemcitabine effectiveness".

Is Metaplastic Breast cancer that rare?

Is Metaplastic Breast Cancer that rare?  We all want to know!

I loved this abstract of an article I found from the ASCO conference.  It talks about how Metaplastic Breast Cancer (MBC) is often confused with IDC.

The exact quote is below:

Triple positive metaplastic breast cancer

One woman with Metaplastic Breast Cancer emailed me a few weeks ago.  She was on our Facebook group but decided to leave just over a year ago.  Leaving the group, joining the group leaving and joining .... is very common.  Cancer is about different emotions and women deal with it in any way they can.  We are just happy when we can support.

Preview

Anyway, back to the point. She wanted to share her pathology with me.  I was always concerned because she had chemo first.  But after she explained her pathology - I understood.  She is triple positive metaplastic breast cancer.