Breast Cancer Diagnosis

Testing for HER2-positive breast cancer begins with testing for breast cancer in general. If you have a suspicious lump, mass or other lesion in your breast your doctor will take a sample of the tissue by doing a fine needle aspiration, a needle... Full Answer

HER2/neu status: About 1 of 5 breast cancers have too much of a growth-promoting protein called HER2/neu (often just shortened to HER2). The HER2/neu gene instructs the cells to make this protein. Tumors with increased levels of HER2/neu are referred to... Full Answer

A type of biopsy, fine needle aspiration is a procedure used to extract tissue from masses or cysts for examination. With ultrasound guidance, the physician places a very fine, hollow needle into the cyst and removes a small sample of fluid from the... Full Answer

Breast cancer affects about one out of eight women in America. Watch as Dr. Oz discusses breast cancer with singer Sheryl Crow and Dr. Kristi Funk in this video about mammograms and other ways to detect the disease. Full Answer

Surgical biopsies include removing the entire mass or tumor from the lung in lung cancer. This allows for a very complete staging of the cancer and for special studies to be performed on the tissue that may help guide therapy. Full Answer

Several new imaging methods are now being studied for evaluating abnormalities that may be breast cancers. Scintimammography (molecular breast imaging):  In scintimammography, a slightly radioactive tracer called technetium sestamibi is injected... Full Answer

The American Cancer Society recommends:Women age 40 and older should have a screening mammogram every year and should continue to do so for as long as they are in good health. Current evidence supporting mammograms is even stronger than in the past. In... Full Answer

Computer-aided detection and diagnosis (CAD): Over the past 2 decades, computer-aided detection and diagnosis (CAD) has been developed to help radiologists detect suspicious changes on mammograms. This can be done with standard film mammograms or with... Full Answer

Researchers have found that looking at the patterns of a number of different genes at the same time (sometimes referred to as gene expression profiling) can help predict whether or not an early stage breast cancer is likely to come back after initial... Full Answer

A bone scan can help show whether a cancer has spread (metastasized) to your bones. It can be more useful than standard x-rays because it can show all of the bones of the body at the same time. For this test, a small amount of low-level radioactive... Full Answer