What Are the Stages of Breast Cancer?

Breast cancer is staged based on the extent of spread and involvement. Stage zero breast cancer which comprises about 25% of all breast cancers diagnosed today is what we call DCIS from non invasive breast cancer. These are cancer cells who truly is breast cancer but they're contained within the ducts by getting rid of the cancer in the breast.

This disease really has very little capacity to spread, and so really by just getting rid of it, either through lumpectomy and radiation or vasectomy, it should be very, very highly treatable and curable, truly on the order of 98 or 99%. As we work our way up the stages, stage one breast cancer is a small invasive cancer, up to two centimeters with no Lymph node involvement.

Stage two is breast cancer that is slightly larger, with a tumor slightly larger bigger than two centimeter, and or a minimal lymph node involvement. Stage three is preserved for women with pretty aggressive large cancer's, and there were multiple, multiple lymph nodes involved, or local spread of the cancer.

Stage four means the cancer has spread beyond the local and regional areas. May be beyond the breast, beyond the [xx] to other parts of the body. Typically, spreads to the liver, the lung, the bones and the brain, that's stage four disease..