Sometimes it's easy to get frustrated when improvements in care and research results are slow to materialize. Yet if we look back over time, we can see that some great things have happened in breast cancer treatment. Consider this:

• For decades, the standard of care for breast cancer was a total radical mastectomy: removal of the breast, all lymph nodes, and the chest muscles. This was very debilitating surgery. Today, more than 80 percent of women are candidates for lumpectomy surgery and most are candidates for sentinel node biopsy, two procedures with far less impact on how a patient's breasts look and how quickly she rebounds from surgery.
  
  
• Years ago, we had one chemotherapy drug to offer. Now there are more than a dozen that provide more targeted treatment and obliteration of this disease than ever before.
  
  
• Years ago, radiation couldn't be focused on just one spot, so healthy tissue and organs got irradiated along with the cancer cells. New technology now allows us to beam the radiation quite narrowly to one specific dot. And there are also options for administering radiation in a shorter time frame than ever before.
  
  
• Hormonal therapy also has come a long way, with more knowledge of how hormone receptors influence breast cancer growth and recurrence as well as more choices for short- and long-term hormonal therapy.
  
  
• Reconstruction basically didn't exist years ago. Now we can use fat from your tummy, derriere, or other areas to create a new breast while preserving your muscles and providing you a nice cosmetic outcome.
  
  
• Knowledge is mounting that will help us create "designer therapies" specifically suited to an individual woman's breast cancer. And research is underway to determine if laser ablation can be used to kill breast cancer cells, eliminating the need for lumpectomy or mastectomy surgery.

Will the day come when breast cancer will be listed in the medical books under the heading "Cured Diseases"? I believe the answer is yes. And I believe I will see it in my lifetime. Science is providing more answers every day that are helping us to understand how this disease works and how it can be prevented. The time will come when we will be able to give children a vaccine that will prevent their breasts from growing breast cancer cells.

So if you feel as if things haven't changed, think again. They have, and for the better. More changes will come for as long as we need them to. Nothing would give me more pleasure than seeing my job eliminated one day, because there will be no more patients in need of breast cancer services or support!