Pathology Report

When taken out, the cancer was 2.3 cm (almost one inch) - it had grown from 1.7 cm to 2.3 cm.

• Stage: IIB (Staging is the process of finding out how widespread a cancer is when it is diagnosed. The stage of a cancer is the most important factor in considering treatment options. The tumor is larger than 2 cm in diameter and less than 5 cm and has spread to 1 to 3 axillary lymph nodes; or cancer is found by sentinel node biopsy as microscopic disease in internal mammary nodes; or the tumor is larger than 5 cm and does not grow into the chest wall and has not spread to lymph nodes. In all cases, the cancer hasn't spread to distant sites)
• Histologic Type: Invasive Ductal Carcinoma (which means the cancer started in the duct, but then has broken free from the duct and invaded surrounding tissue)
• Histologic Grade: Grade III, 9 out of 9 points (1 meaning less agressive and 9 being the most agressive) (Pathologists often assign a histologic grade to a patient’s cancerous breast tumor to identify the type of tumor present and help determine the patient’s prognosis a.k.a. projected outcome)
• Tubule formation: minimal, less than 10% (score = 3, meaning the worst)
• Nuclear Pleomorphism: marked increase in size, nucleoli, chromatin clumping, etc (score = 3, meaning the worst)
• Mitotic Count: Greater than 11 mitoses per 10 HPF (score = 3, meaning the worst)

So that means my cancer was EXTREMELY agressive.

The surrounding tissue was clear, meaning that the surgeon got all the cancer out of the breast tissue, but the fact that it was in one of my lymph nodes, means that it has spread to other parts of my body, meaning a very agressive chemo treatment ahead.