Full Description
This original fourteen chapter book is a brief, slightly autobiographic tale of medical oncologists, surgeons, radiation oncologists, and breast cancer patients in a well-established cancer center in Texas, who pursued the goal of cure for breast cancer. The evolution of improved outcomes in the treatment of microscopic metastatic breast cancer is also the story of the development of adjuvant chemotherapy for post-operative breast disease. The adjuvant therapy of breast cancer came about with the realization that this malignancy, when diagnosed in most patients, had spread beyond the confines of the primary cancer.
Contents
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Acknowledgements
Foreword - by Joni Rodgers
Preface
Chapter 1 - Anatomy of an Oncologist
Case Study - Janet - Highly Sensitive Measurable Metastatic Breast Cancer
Case Study - Susan - Importance of Axillary Node Involvement
Chapter 2 - Milestones along the Road to the Cure
Case Study - Sara - Liver Metastases
Chapter 3 - The Evolving Goal of Cure and Inflammatory Breast Cancer
Case Study - Martha - The Texas Challenge
Chapter 4 - Adjuvant Therapy Advances
Case Study - Joy - Stage IV NED as a Testing Ground for Adjuvant Therapy
Case Study - Carol - Metastasis to Cervical Vertebra
Case Study - Amy - Academia vs. Efficacy
Chapter 5 - Marching Forward
Case Study - Beatta - Second Guessing the System
Case Study - Lisa - The Patient of the Future
Conclusion - Where Do We Stand in the Quest for the Cure?
APPENDICES
Milestones in Adjuvant Therapy
Breast Cancer Stages
Abbreviation Glossary
