Cancer metastasized to lung once breast cancer patients had cough and chest pain?

Cancer metastasized  to lung once breast cancer patients had cough and chest pain?  In recent years, with the improvement of breast cancer treatment methods, its prognosis has greatly improved, but once recurrence and metastasis, its treatment difficulty will be greatly increased, and the prognosis will also be significantly worse.

The lung is a common metastatic site of breast cancer, and it is also the most distant metastatic site of breast cancer. There are 75% of breast cancer recurrence patients will have lung metastasis. Therefore, once many breast cancer patients develop symptoms such as coughing, chest pain, etc., they will inevitably feel worried and think about lung metastasis.

So, how do breast cancer patients identify whether their cough is a sign and symptom of lung metastasis?

Lung metastasis of breast cancer

The lung metastasis of breast cancer is mostly formed by the blood circulation pathway. Cancer cells enter the venous blood stream along the breast vein, flow through the lungs, stay and grow in the lung capillaries, then penetrate the blood vessel wall and enter the lung tissue to form lung metastases of cancer.

Common signs of breast cancer lung metastasis

Because metastatic cancer does not directly invade the airway mucosal epithelium of the lung, the clinical manifestations are often different from those of primary lung cancer, and there are usually no clinical symptoms and signs in the early stage of metastasis. Most patients only found multiple nodular shadows of varying sizes in the lungs only when they were undergoing routine X-ray chest radiography. The lesions were more common in both lungs at the same time. Clinically, when other infectious diseases are excluded, the diagnosis can be confirmed by combining the manifestations of the primary breast cancer.

The late stage of breast cancer lung metastasis often invades the pleura, which can produce chest pain and pleural effusion; when it invades the large lung bronchus, it can produce symptoms such as dry cough or blood in sputum; when it invades the hilar or mediastinal lymph nodes, it can cause breathing difficulties and eating Compression symptoms such as a sense of blocking; a small number of patients with cancer may oppress the recurrent laryngeal nerve and have hoarse voice; a few cases may also have cancerous lymphangitis, which is clinically manifested as obvious cough, shortness of breath, and cyanosis. There is no abnormality or abnormality in early X-rays. Only the lung texture is increased, and attention should be paid to distinguish it from interstitial pneumonia to avoid misdiagnosis.

Lung lesions in breast cancer patients are lung metastases

Breast cancer patients have symptoms such as coughing, chest pain, and finding pulmonary nodules, which are not entirely pulmonary metastases, but may also be benign lesions such as inflammatory and tuberculosis. Of course, there is another situation that cannot be ignored, that is, primary Lung cancer. Breast cancer patients have found problems with the diagnosis and treatment of the lesions in the lungs. If there are multiple nodules and lumps of varying sizes in the lungs, the possibility of breast cancer metastasis is extremely high. However, when there is only one solitary nodule or mass in the lung, the nature cannot only consider the case of breast cancer and lung metastasis, but it must be considered that it may be primary lung cancer.

According to statistics, breast cancer patients are twice as likely to develop lung cancer as normal people. It has been reported that about 3-5% of breast cancer patients will find lung nodules during follow-up, including breast cancer lungs. Metastasis, there are also primary lung cancer.

Therefore, when breast cancer patients experience symptoms such as coughing and chest pain, don’t panic first. It may not be that lung metastasis has occurred. At this time, a chest X-ray or CT should be done for examination, and PET-CT can also be done if necessary. Of course, for breast cancer patients, it is wiser not to wait for problems and then to be anxious, and to insist on regular review according to the doctor’s advice. If there is no problem, it is best to find and treat the problem early.

(source:internet, reference only)

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