UAE: One in every 8 women can suffer from breast cancer, regular self-examination is the best way to fight the disease

Being an advocate for yourself and reiterating the importance of regular self-examination for early detection of breast cancer was the collective urge of doctors who gathered during a pan UAE breast cancer awareness initiative on Thursday.

October is recognised as the Breast Cancer Awareness Month in the country, and experts at the ‘Pink Warriors’ event that was held at Shangri-la Dubai, insisted on early screening to prevent morbidity.

Dr Amal Hassan Abdelaziz –Specialist, Clinical Lecturer and Chair of OBS & Gynaecology, Thumbay University Hospital, Ajman said, “Early detection is the way forward to prevent having morbidity and to eliminate it before it becomes cancer. Which means that it is detected while it hasn't advanced beyond a few cells in the breast, and where one can continue on for life, and survive. But still, at this point, the person can have the risk of recurrent cancer, so they have to go for screening."

One in every eight women can suffer from breast cancer. Though the disease peaks at the ages of 40 or 50, people older than that can also suffer from it. "At the age of 40 and 50, these cancers are more active, because people go through menopause, and it is around the perimenopause time where we have more oestrogen. During this time, people also have other things like bleeding. At this time, when the hormones go off a little bit, start getting more oestrogen. This will affect ageing, having been subjected to a lot of things that could cause mutations. During this time a lot of things look different. Our skin looks different. Every cell looks different. So, these are the factors,” Dr Abdelaziz added.

Breast cancer symptoms include a lump or swelling in the breast, upper chest or armpit, abnormal changes in breast or nipple colour, shape or size, and unusual nipple discharge.

Dr Verushka Mansukhani, Specialist General Surgeon, Prime Hospital explains how the cancer is spreading to the younger age groups as well.

The eating habits of people are shifting these days, say medics. There's a rampant use of hormones and due to pollution, people are getting exposed to different kinds of chemicals.

"This is the only type of cancer where we say, after a patient is diagnosed with it, it is more systemic and it has spread somewhere. Patients are always called survivors. They've never seen a permanent cure as, the cancer can come back at any age after 20 or 25 years. There is no absolute cure, and the incidence has increased a lot. So that's why we have so many programmes with the help of the Dubai Health Authority (DHA) that we do a lot of screening programmes.

• Understanding Breast Cancer: Early Detection is Key to Timely Intervention