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Lobular Breast Cancer: Let's share and support each other
Breast Cancer | Last Active: 20 hours ago | Replies (612)Comment receiving replies
@wews I'm interested that you had a bilateral mastectomy for stage 1a ILC. Mine was stage 1a also, diagnosed last August, tumor was 7mm & I had a lumpectomy with 5-day radiation & now take 10 mg (half-dose) of Tamoxifen (I'm 72 & need the bone protection). No real side effects. Any reason you chose bilateral mastectomy over lumpectomy? Every story is interesting & helpful!
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@jmab yes I chose it because of what the surgeon said. She said with a lumpectomy and radiation, I had a 15% rate of reoccurrence and with a mastectomy I had a 2% chance of reoccurrence. This is from a surgical perspective. I didn’t want two different breasts and I avoided radiation which would have been close to my heart.
I am 71 and I am curious about your taking a half of tamoxifen to protect your bones. I didn’t want to do tamoxifen because of the risk for uterine cancer. Are you tested regularly for that? You haven’t had any side effects? And why a half a dose? I sometimes wonder about alternatives to Letrozole and have been afraid to do the tamoxifen. Can you provide insight into your decision there? I agree it is so helpful to understand why we each make such unique decisions. ILC is so different from other breast cancer yet the treatments aren’t specific to us. I don’t think the data about cancer is either! Thanks.