‘Cancer’ a very common word to today’s world. According to GLOBOCAN 2020 there are 37.4 million estimated cancer cases (including nonmelanoma skin cancer) and 19.9 million estimated deaths (including nonmelanoma skin cancer). Female breast cancer is the most common cancer found with 2.3 million reported cases. It has surpassed lung cancer. Breast cancer contributes 11.7% of total cancer patient in world.
History Of Breast Cancer Treatments
According to some records ancient Egyptians were first to discover the diseases nearly 3500 years ago. (Descriptions of Edwin smith and George Ebers Papyri) said as ‘bulging tumors of the breast that has no cure’. After this in A.D 200, Galen described the cancer as excessive black bile. But Hippocrates (father of western medicine) postulated that some tumors were more dangerous than others. Hippocrates suggested medications like opium, castor oil, licorice, sulfur etc. For medical therapy of breast cancer. This was the time when breast cancer was a disease that affected the whole body and thus surgery wasn’t considered.
As we know, in Middle Ages most of the things were affected by religious propaganda. Christian thoughts surgery was barbaric and were in favor of faith healing. Islamic doctors explored Greek text for breast cancer.
Doctor started exploring the human body in renaissance period. And surgery was again considered as an option. John Hunter, who is known as the Scottish father of investigative surgery. He found lymph to be a Cause of Breast Cancer. Lymph is colorless fluid in human body which carries white blood cell.
Lumpectomies, a surgery to remove breast cancer tumor were also performed by surgeons. But at that time anesthesia wasn’t introduced. Surgeons need to be very fast and accurate to be successful in those surgeries.
Leading French physician Henri Le Dran and Claude-Nicolas Le Cat were first one who argued that removing of breast is the best possible solution to breast cancer. They pointed that removing of lymph nodes and armpits could help in great extent. This discussion led to creation of radical mastectomy. Mastectomy is extensive removal of the breast.
Post 19th Century
By mid-nineteenth century, surgery was one of the options for breast cancer. The development of antiseptic, anesthesia (Anesthesia is the use of medicines to prevent pain during surgery and other procedures) and blood transfusion [to transfer (the blood of one person] into the veins of another during this time also made survival after a surgery more possible.
There was risk of spreading of cancer while removing the nodes in armpits and in chest when removed singly. But a radical breast surgery of breast cancer performed in New York by William Halstead went to become a gold standard for next 100 years. Because he was able to remove axillary nodes (nodes in the armpits) and chest muscles in a single en bloc procedure.
Radical mastectomy was the mostly used treatment till 1940’s. radical mastectomy, if done earlier would help women to live longer. Due to concern of body figure many women didn’t choose it. After mastectomy patient faced problems of deformed chest wall, swelling in arms etc.
At start of later half of twentieth century, George Crile (in 1955) and Bernard Fisher suggested cancer was not localized over one point in body but it’s spreading continuously. Further Fisher suggested of metastasize (spread to other sites in the body by metastasis). According to result published by Fisher in 1976, simpler breast-conserving surgery followed by radiation or chemotherapy were as effective as radical mastectomy.
With development of modern medicine, by 1995, less than 10 percent of breast cancer-inflicted women had a mastectomy. This time of medical science saw a development of therapies for breast cancer. Hormone Therapy, Surgeries, and Biological Therapies.
Rise of Multidisciplinary Team
Many different departments are working for Breast Cancer Treatment. Departments like Surgery, Oncology, Pathology, Radiology come together to make overall treatment of patient. This is called a Multidisciplinary Team.
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Breast Cancer Surgeon & Gynaec Onco Surgeon in Mumbai, India
As described by his patients, Dr. Vishnu Agarwal always keeps patients’ interest at the core, throughout the treatment.
He has a vibrant personality that relieves patients and their family members from the anxiety. This plays an important role in patients healing much faster.