Breast Cancer Although It Remains True That Term Paper

Breast Cancer

Although it remains true that many Americans will die of acute illnesses, injuries, and accidents, it is at the same time becoming the case that more and more Americans are dying of chronic diseases such as cancer. In fact, cancer is expected in the future to be the leading cause of death in the United States, and any integrated plan for providing quality medical (including) nursing services in the future must focus on the treatment of such long-term illnesses.

Among the most common forms of cancers, breast cancer cases are increasing the most quickly (Ku 2001), with the overall lifetime risk for American women having grown to one in eight (American Cancer Society, 2001). The reason for this increase is not understood, although a number of factors are known to come into play, and it may be possible that the increased risk is a combination of these various known factors, which include increased overall environmental exposure to known cancer-causing agents as well as delays in first pregnancies and less time spent breastfeeding infants.

It is also possible that the rise in reported incidents of breast cancer may in fact be to some extent an artifact, that it may in fact reflect simply a rise in reported rather than actual incidents. Women are today more aware of the risks of breast cancer than their grandmothers or mothers - or probably even older sisters - were and are more likely to perform self-exams and to have mammograms and other professionally performed exams (American Cancer Society, 2001). This combination of self-examination and examination by medical staff may well have combined to increase greatly the reported incidence of breast cancer rather than indicating that a true rise in breast cancer cases exists, or that the true rise in breast cancer cases is in fact as high as it currently appears.

The true rate at which breast cancer is occurring, and the relationship between this rate and the rate a generation ago is, thus, not precisely known or understand. One thing that is well understood, however, is the fact that mortality from breast cancer cases is dropping. Even though the overall number of cases of breast cancer is rising, the overall mortality figures are dropping, indicating that American women are detecting their cancers at an earlier and earlier point.

One of the most important tools that can be used to detect breast cancer at an earlier stand is, of course, self breast exam. However, not all women perform self breast exams and do not, therefore profit from the potential…