Breast cancer: diagnosis and treatment

Advanced breast cancer is a complicated disease. To adequately treat it, the physician must fully stage the patient. Treatment options are determined by the amount of disease and the type of breast cancer. These include hormonal therapy, chemotherapy, surgical therapy, and radiotherapy. At times some or all of these are used either in combination or sequentially. Newer experimental therapies are promising. Even so, once the disease has spread beyond the breast and regional lymph nodes, it is not generally curable. Emphasis on early detection is justified for this reason.