Don't touch your breasts like this

Self-examination is one of the most basic ways to prevent and detect breast cancer early. It is worth reminding that in addition to using medical means to regularly examine the breasts and detect clues of breast cancer as early as possible, self-examination once a month is also one of the basic methods. However, many women, when doing breast self-examination, often touch the breasts randomly according to their own preferences, and think that it is fine as long as they feel that there is nothing wrong, thus delaying the discovery of the disease.

Breast Myth 1: Touching Breasts = Self-Examination

For women, self-examination is as important as going to the hospital for regular physical examinations, or even more important. Clinical findings in my country show that many breast cancer patients seek medical treatment after self-examination. The rate of breast cancer visits is very high in summer, but it does not mean that breast cancer is more prevalent in summer. It is because women take more baths in summer and the number of breast "self-examinations" increases accordingly, so the number of people visiting the hospital increases.

Experts: It is recommended that husbands touch their wives' breasts moderately every day

Husbands, as long as conditions permit, should caress their wife's breasts with moderate force every day. Husbands should slowly learn to touch from the inside to the outside, in circles, and slowly learn to touch every "hard core" of the round breasts with their fingers. They should tenderly and gently ask their wives, "Does it hurt when you press here?" If a wife's breast swelling and pain are related to her menstruation, frequent loving touch by her husband is an extremely healthy and environmentally friendly treatment method, both from a purely medical point of view and from the perspective of spiritual feedback to the female center of the hypothalamus.

Doing this for a long time can not only maintain the love between husband and wife, but also detect any abnormalities or discomforts in time, and take time to go to a better hospital's thoracic surgery department for examination, or even do B-ultrasound and X-ray mammography, because early examination can detect whether you have breast tumors.

I am both a doctor and a husband, and I have heard and seen many breast cancer patients in recent years. In addition to the patients from the city and the country whom I see at work, my third cousin, my wife's second aunt, and several female colleagues in the medical system have unfortunately suffered from this disease, which requires breast removal but is difficult to cure.

Breast cancer is a disease that causes great psychological and physical harm to women, from the pain after contracting it to the subsequent surgical treatment. The psychological trauma in particular is difficult to recover from. Women are naturally sensitive to psychological factors. "Two breasts" reflect a full figure and please both themselves and their husbands. If one of them is cut off, even if the husband is as loving as before, the woman will bear a heavy psychological burden of whether he will dislike her for no longer being beautiful and charming, or whether he will find another man to enjoy his company, etc., which will ultimately affect the overall treatment effect.

A simple way to detect diseases

1. Time selection. Premenopausal women usually perform self-examination 7-10 days after menstruation. At this time, the breasts are softer and any lumps are easier to find. Postmenopausal women can choose a fixed day every month to perform self-examination.

2. The inspection should be comprehensive. Touch all the parts that should be touched, and don't miss any.

3. Observe in the mirror. The main thing is to see whether the shape of the breast has changed, whether the nipple is sunken, whether the skin is sunken, etc.

4. Posture and method. The method of self-examination is to use the tips of your index and middle fingers to check the opposite breast. The finger tips are more sensitive and problems can be easily found. The position can be standing or lying on your back. If lying on your back, you can place a pillow under your chest.

If you do the above and seek medical attention whenever you find any problems, the incidence of late-stage breast cancer will be greatly reduced.

Breast misunderstanding 2: Touching randomly and finding a lump and then letting it go

In clinical practice, we often encounter some female patients who, although they have felt a lump themselves, do not seek medical treatment in time due to busy work or family affairs, thus missing the best time for treatment. "After three months or six months, when they remember to go to the hospital, the early stage has already developed into the late stage. The most common type of women who come to the outpatient clinic are those who have been delayed by accompanying their children to take the college entrance examination."

If the disease is discovered and treated early, the patient may be able to survive for a long time without any other auxiliary treatments. However, if the disease is delayed and becomes in the late stage, it will be difficult to cure. Don't touch your breasts like this

Breast self-examination is best performed in the following three situations:

1. When taking a bath. Especially after applying shower gel, it is easy to move your hands over the lubricated skin. Move your flat hand gently to examine every part of the breast. Use your right hand to check the left breast and your left hand to check the right breast, and feel and press the breasts for lumps, nodules, or thickening.

2. Check in front of the mirror. Stand in front of a mirror with your hands hanging down by your sides, then slowly raise them above your head and observe any changes in your breasts, including any swelling, dimpling of the skin, or retraction of the nipples. Next, put your hands on your hips and observe whether your breasts are symmetrical.

3. Lie flat on your back with your shoulders slightly elevated. Place your hand flat on the skin and press the skin lightly, starting from the outer upper part of the breast, check the right breast in a clockwise direction and the left breast in a counterclockwise direction, from the outer edge of the breast to the nipple. Pay attention to palpate the opposite armpit to check for lumps in the caudate lobe of the breast. Be sure to gently squeeze the nipple between your thumb and index finger to observe for nipple discharge.

Generally speaking, the best time to do self-examination is 9-11 days after the onset of menstruation. Women who have reached menopause can do self-examination on a fixed day each month. If you find any abnormal lumps, nipple discharge during non-lactation, swollen axillary lymph nodes, and upper limb edema, you should get further examination immediately.

Breast misunderstanding three: Ignoring the doctor's empirical manual examination

In addition to breast self-examination, regular medical examinations are also essential for early detection of breast cancer. Experts say: "Since Western women have larger breasts, the mammography results are very clear, but Chinese women's breasts are generally smaller and denser, and the age of breast cancer patients is also younger than that of foreign women (the average age of breast cancer in foreign countries is 45-55 years old, while in China it is 35-45 years old). Therefore, it is currently believed that B-ultrasound examination is more suitable for Chinese women."

In addition, manual diagnosis by an experienced doctor is also very important. "Some tumors that cannot be found by B-ultrasound and mammography can be felt by experienced doctors, such as some tumors on the edge or under the areola."

Breast misunderstanding 4: Physiological pain is too stressful

While some women are "indifferent" to their breasts, others show excessive anxiety about them. Breast tenderness before menstruation and mild breast hyperplasia during physical examinations have caused many women to panic and seek medical advice everywhere.

Breast pain is mostly a physiological change, and there is no pain in the early stages of breast cancer. The structure of the breast is composed of ducts and alveoli, which are controlled by different hormones: the ducts are controlled by estrogen and the alveoli are controlled by progesterone. Cyclic changes in estrogen and progesterone cause changes in the ducts and alveoli. Excessive changes in each hormone will cause excessive proliferation of the corresponding tissue, resulting in secretions, fluid accumulation and even cysts, which will lead to swelling, pain or lumps. But most of these physiological changes are transient and will heal on their own after a period of time.

Breast Myth 5: Early Patients Don’t Cooperate

Some patients become particularly scared after being diagnosed with breast cancer and become restless every day. This is wrong and does not help with treatment at all. Sun Qiang said, "If you have breast cancer, the first thing you need to do is to understand it. Blindly worrying about it will not help."

In fact, 95% of early breast cancer patients can survive for a long time. Early breast cancer can even be removed from the classification of cancer. "It is curable." Therefore, it is imperative to learn about it and choose a professional medical unit that you trust. "Any patient who discovers the cancer early and does not receive treatment is making a mistake. If they do not go to the hospital promptly after the cancer is discovered, and instead blindly believe in folk remedies and miracle drugs, which results in the cancer rapidly worsening, it will be too late to regret."

The correct way to do a breast self-examination:

The correct method is to use your palm or fingers together to gently touch the breast with the fingertips, otherwise it is easy to mistake normal breast tissue for a lump. And don't forget to check the armpits and clavicle, because some hyperplastic tissue may be around the breasts, especially in the armpits, in addition to the breasts.