Wouldn't it be great if we could find breast cancer long before something appears on a mammogram?

An FDA approved test called the Halo Breast Pap Test System might be able to do just that by collecting Nipple Aspirate Fluid (NAF). The test is designed to detect abnormal cells in the breast. The Halo system can identify benign disease as well as abnormal ductal cells that can be precursors to cancer.

Some research has suggested that ductal fluid excreted from the nipple can be used to identify a women's specific risk of breast cancer. A women with abnormal cells in the fluid has a four to five times greater risk of developing breast cancer.

Think about this:

The introduction of the HALO Breast Pap Test has been compared to the introduction of the Cervical Pap Test in the 1950s, which is widely credited with reducing cervical cancer death rates by more than 70 percent through the identification of abnormal cells in the cervix. Whether the same can be said for the breast pap test remains to be seen, but it is likely that the screen will be adopted by more OB-GYNs as oncologists push for ever earlier identification of cancer.

Cancer is a complicated disease often described by those who know it well in confusing medical, technical, and scientific terms. There's a way to understand it in simple terms, though. And a recent CBS news story features a great run-down on the disease, its causes, how it grows, and more.

Think about this:

• Cancer refers to any one of a large number of diseases characterized by the uncontrollable growth of abnormal cells. These cells have the ability to infiltrate and destroy normal tissue and can spread -- metastasize -- throughout the body.

• Cancer is caused by damage in the DNA. DNA is like a set of instructions for cells and tells cells how to grow and divide. Normal cells can develop mutations in their DNA but can repair most of them. If they cannot make a repair, the cells often die. But certain mutated cells don't repair and don't die. They instead grow and become cancerous.

• Normal, healthy cells grow in an orderly, well-controlled way. They live for a set period of time and then die on schedule. Dead cells are replaced by new normal cells. Cancer cells, in contrast, grow in an uncontrolled manner. They don't die. They accumulate. One malignant cell becomes two, two become four, four become eight, and so on, until a mass of cells -- a tumor -- is created. Tumors remain small until they're able to attract their own blood supply, which allows them to obtain the oxygen and nutrients they need to grow larger.

• Not all cancers form tumors. Leukemia, for example, is a cancer of the blood, bone marrow, lymphatic system, and spleen.
  
  
• Cancer can take decades to develop. By the time a cancerous mass is detected, it's likely that 100 million to one billion cancer cells are present, and the original cancer may have been dividing for five years or more.

• Lung cancer is the top cancer killer among men and women and will kill 160,390 people in 2007.

I still can't believe I got breast cancer. I really can't believe it's been two years since my whole journey began.

I found a lump in my breast on November 16, 2004. It took eight days of doctoring and worry before the mystery that lingered beneath the skin of my left breast unfolded.

Ever since that November day, I have been documenting my struggles and triumphs with a disease that turned my life upside down.

It all started exactly like this.

On November 16, 2004, I felt a lump in my left breast while taking a shower. I have always been aware of what my breasts feel like. I have a lot of dense tissue -- so dense that the surgeon who performed my breast reduction had trouble separating the tissue to take some out and leave some in.

My breasts always seem lumpy to me and I never knew if I'd be able to tell the difference between normal and abnormal tissue. Four years ago I had a mammogram because of something I felt. It all turned out fine -- it was just the dense tissue. All of my annual GYN visits have revealed nothing abnormal. But I've always been aware and curious which is why I found something in the shower. I knew it was not normal.

It was hard and felt like a small green pea. It moved around and for the first few days, I had a hard time locating it. Once I became obsessed with it, I could find it immediately.

Back in the summer of 2000, a year before I was diagnosed with breast cancer, I was told I had an abnormal pap smear. Cancerous and precancerous changes in the cervical cells are often first detected by the pap test. A sample of cells are removed from the cervix and then examined under a microscope. If the pap test does come back abnormal the physician will usually schedule a colposcopy. I was advised after my abnormal pap smear to go through this procedure. A colposcopy is when the doctor will use a microscope to better see the cervix and find abnormal cells that he can then remove and further evaluate. This procedure was not any more uncomfortable than a normal gynecological visit, except for the mild cramping afterward.

Unfortunately upon further evaluation I was diagnosed with cervical dysplasia which lead to me getting the LEEP procedure, loop electrosurgical excision procedure, an outpatient surgery. I was very scared since I had never been put under general anesthesia. I came out of the surgery and again all that happened was more cramping throughout the next few days. Since that time I have had normal pap smears and never miss my yearly appointment to get this test done.

A phase II clinical trial suggests that daily treatment of Celebrex (celecoxib) may effectively treat high-grade precancerous changes to the cervix. The results were published in the journal Gynecologic Oncology. Celebrex belongs to the class of drugs known as non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs. Researchers took 25 patients with high grade precancerous changes of the cervix and treated them with either Celebrex 200mg twice a day or a placebo.

The results showed that cervical abnormalities improved in 75 percent of patients treated with Celebrex and 31 percent of patients treated with the placebo. A complete disappearance of detectable cervical abnormalities was experienced by 33 percent of patients treated with Celebrex and 15 percent of patients treated with placebo.

The researchers conclude that Celebrex could offer a noninvasive approach to treating precancerous cervical changes. Larger studies are needed to confirm these findings.

Even though the LEEP procedure was not that terrible, it would have definitely been better to take a pill instead. I do hope this proves to be successful in the treatment of cervical dysplasia.

In 2006, 174,470 people will be diagnosed with lung cancer in the United States. About 92,700 men and 81,770 women will develop the disease -- the leading cause of cancer death among both men and women.

An estimated 162,460 men and women will die of lung cancer this year, accounting for 28 percent of all cancer deaths and taking more lives than colon, breast, and prostate cancers combined. While most people diagnosed with lung cancer will die within the first two years of diagnosis -- this has not changed in 10 years -- some people are cured. There are currently about 333,000 long-term survivors.

All cancers are not treated equally. Some attract a frenzy of attention -- breast cancer -- and some receive not much attention at all -- gallbladder cancer. Some are vigorously researched and studied. Others sit by idly, rarely the subject of investigation. Some are feverishly funded. Some never prosper by way of financial support. Yet they all share something very important in common. They are all cancer.

All cancers are marked by an uncontrollable division and spread of abnormal cells. And they are all capable of delivering shock and despair and even death to any one of us. And that makes each one -- brain cancer, cervical cancer, colon cancer, eye cancer, liver cancer, prostate cancer, stomach cancer, you name it -- worthy of equal attention.

And so I bring to you Cancer by the Numbers, a series of posts that will feature the basics about all sorts of cancer, beginning with the numbers -- the statistics -- to help define the prevalence of each cancer, followed by important facts about screening, diagnosis, treatment, survival, and more. I will cover the well-known cancers, the sort-of-known cancers, the barely-known cancers. And while I can only offer what I can track down on each form of cancer, I intend to dish out every piece of data I can dig up -- so we all can become a little more informed, a little more prepared should we have to personally do battle with any one of the 100 possible cancers out there.

The American Cancer Society reports that 1,399,790 new cancer cases will be diagnosed in 2006. This estimate does not include most carcinoma in situ (noninvasive cancer) cases and also does take into account the estimated one million cases of basal and squamous cell skin cancers that will be diagnosed this year. Of these predicted cases, about 564,830 will result in death -- that's more than 1,500 people each day. Cancer is the second most common cause of death in the United States, exceeded only by heart disease, and accounts for one of every four deaths.

These numbers are staggering. But without further explanation, they are broad and all-encompassing and don't say much about how all the individual diseases add up. That's what I plan to do -- break it all down, cancer by cancer, until the numbers make sense. And the cancers do too.

The Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, a federal agency that conducts research on healthcare quality, costs, outcomes and patient safety has performed a study that shows that other tests other than a biopsy can miss four to nine percent of cancers in women who have an average risk of breast cancer after an abnormal mammogram.

Usually when a women has an abnormal mammogram she will need further testing done. Sometimes testing is performed by MRI, ultrasound or PET scan. This study showed that a biopsy is more effective at detecting breast cancer than the other methods mentioned.

Sometimes we hear about the overuse of biopsies being done since eighty percent of breast abnormalities come out to be benign, however the other twenty percent show to be cancerous.

The research showed that none of the tests mentioned are sufficient to replace biopsy because the screening tests show a two percent risk of missing a cancer in a women who has an abnormal mammogram.

Make sure if you do have an abnormal mammogram that you discuss with your doctor the option to have a biopsy.

You want to be sure your diagnosis is accurate!

Someone once told me to think of cancer as a chronic condition -- an illness like diabetes or asthma that may linger for life and may require continual treatment. And while battling cancer, perhaps for life, I should just hope that medical advances occur and new treatments become available. And maybe, just maybe, the science of medicine will decrease by leaps and bounds the number of people who die from cancer.

During my own battle with cancer -- which has been 18 months long -- two new breast cancer drugs have hit the scene with rave reviews from researchers and medical professionals. This is good news for me because my type of breast cancer makes me a candidate for both drugs. Herceptin is one of these drugs -- given to women who are HER-2/neu positive -- that's me -- and over express a protein that makes the tumor aggressive. Herceptin is received over 52 weeks -- and I go every three weeks for a 90-minute infusion of this clear liquid that causes me really no side effects at all. It can be toxic to the heart but monitoring tests have revealed that my heart is not suffering at this time. And with just three more infusions to go -- one this Wednesday -- I will likely encounter no adverse reactions to this potentially life-saving drug.

And now Tykerb is making headlines. Tykerb, suggested for use with advanced breast cancer and manufactured by British-based GlaxoSmithKline PLC, is an experimental drug that delays the growth of tumors nearly twice as long as standard chemotherapy in patients who no longer respond to Herceptin. This finding, reported this past Saturday at a meeting in Atlanta of the American Society of Clinical Oncology, confirms initial findings about the promise of this drug -- that like Herceptin, made by Genentech, precisely targets tumors without killing lots of healthy cells. The difference between the two drugs is that Herceptin blocks the protein on the cell's surface and Tykerb does it inside the cell -- blocking a second abnormal protein too. And while Herceptin is given intravenously, Tykerb is given in pill form -- which may make it cheaper and easier to use.

While now part of an international study, Tykerb may be available to women in the United States later this year. And it perhaps will be offered in conjunction with Herceptin or instead of Herceptin for women with advanced breast cancer.

I hope I do not ever need Tykerb -- and that Herceptin alone will be enough for me -- but it is comforting to know that there is something else out there. Something that if necessary, just might help me live with this potentially chronic condition called cancer.