A few weeks ago, I noticed a small blood stain and thought maybe it was from our sweet bichon, Daisy, who had had surgery for torn knee ligaments. A week later, I noticed a similar stain in my bra and on my nightgown in the area of my nipple.
Noticing a dark area at the entrance of one of my nipple holes in the breast where I had been diagnosed with breast cancer last year, I expressed my nipple and out came bloody discharge. Panic was probably the first reaction. This has been a difficult health year up to now, and quite frankly, I don't have the mental energy to handle another crisis.
As soon as I could, I did contact the breast surgeon's office and was sent for an ultrasound of the breast as well as another mammogram. This was a follow-up to a very successful yearly mammogram only 2 months ago. The test results showed that nothing changed. So I am really no more knowledgeable of what is causing the problem as I was before the test.
Per the physician, it could be caused by one of 2 things: papilloma (benign wart-like growth) causing distended breast ducts that bleed or cancer. Usually the papilloma would show on the ultrasound, but it may have been so small it didn't display on my test. So the plan is to remove all the offending ducts and send them to pathology on December 14. I'm very comfortable with this decision, and will have an answer regarding the cause when I go back for my surgical follow-up.
The question then becomes how can DCIS come back so soon since it takes 15-20 years to develop? My understanding is that it may have been there all along, but not been diagnostically visible.
Finally, there are 2 ways to view...if the bleeding is caused by papilloma, the surgery will remove the cause and all will go back to the way it was. If the bleeding is caused by cancer, then I was very lucky to have symptoms to look at this further since diagnostically nothing showed on the tests.
I'll be sure to update as soon as I know more. Happy Holidays to all!
No comments:
Post a Comment