Awaiting biopsy results - scared

Have I got breast cancer? Appointments and waiting for test results
1

Hi all, new member here. I’m 51 and on Thursday I attended my local breast clinic for an assessment following my first routine mammogram screening at the end of March.  After a more detailed mammogram and ultrasound I was told they had found a firm lump - less than 2cm in size.  The consultant radiologist said that in 90% of cases she can tell from an ultrasound if a lump is likely to be cancer, but as my lump was “atypical” and “unusual” I was in the 10% of cases where she couldn’t be sure.  I am currently waiting for results of a biopsy but because of the Easter weekend, I need to wait until the 26th to get them and see a consultant breast surgeon.

I don’t know what what was unusual about what the radiologist saw, whether this was a good or bad thing?  Anyone else experienced this? My brain was so shocked I didn’t think to ask this question.

In the space of one month my world has been completely turned upside down.  I am due to start a new job one week after results day so that is an added worry.  If it’s a benign lump, I’ve been thru so much stress that I’m not sure I can give a new job my all, but if it’s malignant then that’s me screwed, my new employer surely will think I’m too risky to take on?

I’m trying to keep busy and spend time in my garden which is where I feel most relaxed.  Family being supportive as much as possible but I have to attend results appointment on my own which I am dreading.

2

Hi

I’m so sorry this mess has spoilt what might have been a beautiful Easter weekend prior to the excitement and challenge of a new job. First of all, everything you describe fits the pattern of how we all react in this early stage of diagnosis - shock, not taking things in, anxiety about results, anxiety about the future - and every one of us would fully empathise.

I too had an atypical lump. In fact, initially my GP could feel no lump at all - I consulted her because I’d spotted two small freckly lumps on my areola and, since my mum had breast cancer twice, I automatically consulted my GP. The story then veers from yours - after a thorough breast examination, she detected a lump between my ribs. Decades earlier I’d had a fibroadenoma (benign lump of fibrous gristle is the best was to describe it I guess) removed and my GP suggested it might be scar tissue. She referred me on just in case but assured me she was sure I had nothing to worry about. I’d had a clear mammogram a few months earlier and, at the hospital I had a clear ultrasound. The consultant was also sure I had nothing to worry about but he did a biopsy on the freckles.

A week later, I was told the biopsy indicated I had breast cancer. A more thorough ultrasound identified two lumps and, as the month passed, I got different diagnoses, culminating in the final and fifth diagnosis after surgery. My GP was shocked and said that she at first thought it must be a mistake because what she felt didn’t feel like the tumours she usually felt. She did say more about the nature of the edges (rough/smooth) but it’s lost in the past now.

Between 60 and 90% of breast lumps presented at breast clinics turn out to be benign - cysts, fibroadenomas etc - so it’s early days to assume you have breast cancer. Being atypical and the radiologist being uncertain could be to your advantage as easily as it might be a breast cancer diagnosis. It might be a good thing, it might not. You wont know till you get to see your consultant next week.

You’re doing the right thing, spending this time in being kind to yourself, keeping your anxiety levels down. Lots of people obsess, start making the disastrous mistake of Googling things (please don’t - it doesn’t know the details of your particular condition) and generally fuelling their fear, only to find it was unnecessary all along. I wish you all the best and hope you find your lump is benign. Early days!

As regards your job, the best thing to do would be to ring the Macmillan helpline to ask what your rights are. If you do have breast cancer, I’m pretty sure they can’t withdraw the job offer as you are automatically registered as ‘disabled’ under the 2010 Equalities Act but a Macmillan adviser will know and put your mind at rest.

Take care

Jan x

3

Just stumbled across this support forum in my mad researching as much as I can about all things biopsies and breast cancer and see you’re having a very similar Easter to me - I too am 51 and got a callback from my first routine mammogram - I naively went to the apt thinking it maybe just needed repeated as not clear but I was told I’d suspicious calcified clusters in several areas of one of my breasts !! And needed a stereotactic biopsy there and then …. Apart from a tiny bit of discharge I’ve had no symptoms at all - anyway like you I am now overthinking during this long wait to get results as labs apparently closed over Easter - told my follow up would be at the cancer clinic at hospital and not the breast screening unit - thankfully over in London at my sons graduation so distracted - but might be another week until I hear anything and this is day 8 since the biopsy …. Sorry for waffle but finding reading all these posts strangely comforting Jx