Pathology Update

Becky is recovering on schedule from her surgery.  Thank you for all of your thoughtfulness and prayers at this time.  We consider ourselves so lucky to have such a great group of friends, neighbors, and family that provide us with so much support.

We were able to log onto the Select Health web site and get some of our pathology reports a little bit early.  Please keep in mind that these results have not been evaluated by the medical team and so any conclusions may be premature.  We will tell you what each of the results are and maybe a little bit of our thoughts, but those thoughts might change after we speak with the medical team.

The tumor ended up being 3.2 centimeters in size.  This is not a small tumor, but it is smaller than the physicians had estimated it to be by looking at the MRI.  The original estimates of 5.5 centimeters carried a worse prognosis, and so we are very happy that it turned out to be smaller than expected.  The tissue is labeled as Invasive Lobular Carcinoma Grade 2.  The margins appeared to be clear, which also seems like good news.

The tumor is HER2 negative.  This is considered to be good.  It is also estrogen receptor and progesterone receptor positive.  These are considered to be good as well because it gives us other options for treatment down the road.

Unfortunately one of the 2 sentinel lymph nodes that were removed was positive for metastatic carcinoma cells.  This does not seem like particularly good news.

We have a follow up appointment with the surgeon tomorrow and an appointment with the oncologist on Tuesday.  We will try to keep you updated.

Thanks again for all of your love and support.