Breast self-examination as part of breast cancer early diagnosis
Breast self-examination as part of breast cancer early diagnosis

Summary/Abstract: Introduction: Palpable findings in women of various age categories, generally called “lumps”, include up to 80 % of benign (non-malignant) breast diseases. Some represent “only” changes in the structure of the gland, e.g. on the basis of diffuse or focal hormonal changes, others belong to typical solid or cystic diseases (fibroadenoma, cyst, adenoma, papillomas, etc.) with typical and less typical clinical findings. Differential diagnosis, diagnosis, management, and treatment are not always simple. Objective: The aim of the work is to verify the benefit of breast self-examination in the population of women up to 45 years of age, the importance of sonography and its place from the point of view of further monitoring of the patient, taking a biopsy and/or indicating a surgical solution. Material and methods: In the retrospective study, we included 97 patients with histologically verified findings of breast cancer in the period January 2017-January 2020. We monitored the age of the women and, in the case of examination, also the palpability of the lesion, the result of the biopsy examination, the grading of intraductal carcinoma, the proliferation index, the presence of HER2, BRCA, family history and lesion size. Results: We divided the patients into 5 groups according to age. We tested the differences between the five groups in the parameters of the proliferation index and the size of the lesions. The lesion must probably reach a certain size for the patient to feel it and seek help. In women under 40 years of age, we did not demonstrate a significant effect of age on the occurrence, grading, histological type, and size of breast tumor lesions. Conclusion: From our results, it appears that all diagnosed carcinomas were within the limits of palpable lesions in size, so that during self-examination or preventive examinations of young women, the lesions are palpable. This clearly testifies to the high benefit of properly implemented breast self-examination and significantly reduces the legitimacy of screening for breast cancer in women under the age of 45 using sonography

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