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Diagram 1.1, Breast Lesion |
Acute trauma to the breast occurs in seat belt injuries producing hematomas
that may result in permanent scars. Chronic trauma in the form of
environmental toxins may predispose to breast cancer. Breast cancer occurs
in different forms. About 25% of proven cancers will remain inactive in the
breast and not grow or metastasize even in the absence of medical
treatment. Many cancers are very low grade and grow slowly
over 5-10 years before turning highly malignant. This type calcifies and is
picked up very well on mammograms. Some cancers grow rapidly and are highly
malignant. These tumors seem to be best diagnosed by sonograms because
sonography can detect a malignancy when it is 1/4 inch in size and is
highly accurate especially in high risk patients with lumpy breasts where
mammograms are of limited diagnostic value. A recent addition to diagnosis
of dangerous masses has been the addition of power Doppler sonography.
This test is simple and shows the blood flow in abnormal vessels
required by cancers to grow and metastasize. The combined use of breast
sonograms with Doppler blood flow study will provide early detection of
most highly malignant cancers resulting in life saving early diagnosis and
sparing the patient radical surgery. This result requires special training
by the physician and state of the art sonograms.
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