Expert: Claes-Gustaf Nordquist, M.D. - 1/9/2009

Question
My mom has type 2b breast cancer or possibly 3.  The stage cannot be determined until surgery.  It has been a year and 2 months since her diagnosis.  My mother is 100 percent against treatment and will not change her mind.  Approximately how long does she have to live?  I cannot find the answer to this anywhere because everyone wants to be optimistic and assume she will change her mind, but i want to know the truth

Answer
Impossible to tell you actually. Both tumors and patients are individuals not identical copies/clones. It depends very much on her particular tumor's rate of growth and tendency to metastasize (spread). On those points I have no information and probably neither have you since even its stage seems uncertain. A more exact information of its stage AND GRADE would be of help but even that would not give you any kind of more exact time line. It would however tell if her tumor is at all curable or not at present. And roughly tell us how bad her tumor is.  Why does she not want to be treated? Is there ANY way of making her change her mind because a stage 2 b or even 3 are treatable and a cure may be possible though the situation is by no means ideal?! A stage 4 however is at present incurable and eventually fatal even though the tumor may be controlled even maybe for quite some time.