Questions to ask about your breast cancer

You can ask your treatment questions about anything to do with your breast cancer diagnosis.

It may take a while for them to gather all the details of your diagnosis while different tests and investigations are carried out. 

You may get bits of information as you go along and sometimes this information can change. 

Here are some of the questions you may want to ask your team.

What type of breast cancer do I have?

There are many different types of breast cancer. 

How big is the cancer? Is there more than one area?

The size of your cancer, and whether there’s more than 1 area of cancer, may affect the type of operation you have and whether you need other treatments as well. 

How quickly is the cancer growing?

Breast cancers are given a grade according to how different the cancer cells are to normal breast cells and how quickly they are growing.

Are there cancer cells in the lymph or blood vessels?

The breast contains blood vessels and other tiny tubes called lymph vessels.

If breast cancer cells spread into these vessels, it’s called lympho-vascular invasion. This increases the chances of the breast cancer spreading to somewhere else in the body.

If you have lymphovascular invasion, you may be offered treatments such as chemotherapy or radiotherapy. 

Has the cancer spread to the lymph nodes under the arm?

If you have invasive breast cancer, your treatment team will usually want to check if any of the lymph nodes (glands) under the arm contain cancer cells. You may have a lymph node biopsy to check this.

Are hormones helping the cancer to grow?

Some breast cancers use the hormones oestrogen or progesterone in the body to help them to grow. These are known as oestrogen receptor positive (ER-positive) and progesterone receptor positive (PR-positive) breast cancers.

Invasive breast cancers are tested to see if they are ER-positive or PR-positive using tissue from a biopsy or after surgery.

Is the cancer HER2-positive, HER2-negative or HER2-low?

Sometimes breast cancer cells have a higher-than-normal level of a protein called HER2 on their surface, which helps them to grow.

Will I have any more tests? 

Your treatment team may do other tests on the cancer. They will explain what the tests are and why they would like you to have them. 

Questions you might want to ask about your treatment include:

1. Why is this the best treatment for me?
2. When will treatment start?
3. How long will my treatment take?
4. What are the possible side effects?
5. How will the treatment affect my everyday life?
6. Where will I need to go for treatment? 
7. Will I need to take time off work?

Write your questions down

It may help to write a list of questions and things you want to discuss, including information about how you’re feeling physically and emotionally. 

Take someone along

You may feel overwhelmed with a lot of new information. It can be useful to take someone with you to appointments who can listen and help you remember what was said.

It can be helpful to talk to whoever came with you afterwards and discuss any decisions you have been asked to make about your care. 

You might want to bring a pen and paper to your appointment so you can make notes. Or you could record the appointment on your phone so you can listen back to it later. Just ask permission first.

Say what you want to say

It helps your treatment team to care for you if they know what your concerns are and what information you would like. Don’t be afraid to say what’s on your mind.

Make sure you get the answers to your questions

It’s important for your wellbeing to have your questions answered. 

If you don’t feel you have had an answer to your question, ask again. 

Sometimes it’s not possible to give a definite answer, but your treatment team should be able to explain why if this is the case.

If you have any questions you feel have not been answered, or would like to talk through any concerns, you can call our helpline to speak to one of our nurses. See below for how to get in touch.