Oncotype DX Test Results

Twenty-four days Post Surgery - Friday

My oncologist ordered a test on the lump after surgery called an Oncotype DX. I did a lot of research on this test because it would determine if I would have chemo after surgery. What I found was interesting. The test has only been widely used for about six years, but they are predicting rates of recurrence up to ten years. I was leary (remember the blog on statistics?). If your “score” is high, they predict that more chemo will save you from having a recurrence of breast cancer. If your “score” is low, they predict that more chemo will do you more harm than good and that your rate of recurrence of very low after taking an estrogen inhibitor for five years. What they don’t say in any of the research I’ve found is how accurate these predictions are and do these statistics include women who have had a double mastectomy. Some of the articles read stated that women who endured more chemo because of their “scores” had a recurrence anyway and that some women with a low “score” also had a recurrence.

After a long conversation with my husband, we decided that no matter what the “score” was I was not going to have any more chemo. There just wasn’t enough data to persuade me to put that kind of poison in my body.

 The small pill I take that is an estrogen inhibitor also eats up my bone density. If my bone density gets so bad that my quality of life is impaired, the doctor and I will have to talk about taking me off of the pill or something else. As it is, my mood swings are all over the place and I am having hot flashes straight from hell. Her reaction to mood swings was “We can put you on an anti-depressant.” To which I replied, let me see if I can keep this under control myself first.” Always a pill – just one more pill and you’ll be fine. Maybe I should try meditation.

But I digress. The Oncotype test was performed at a cost of $3,500. And we waited and sweated and worried until the results came in which seemed insane because we had already decided that the numbers really don’t matter. Randy just kept saying “Remember the bus.” (Not sure I told you the bus story. Here it is – When our first internist told us over 17 years ago that my life expectancy was only 10 years, Randy asked “So, you can guarantee that she won’t get hit by a bus when she leaves this hospital?” The doctor said that nobody can guarantee that. And Randy replied, “Then we won’t talk about life expectancy anymore.” And we didn’t. Hence the phrase, “Remember the bus.”) So, for us, waiting for numbers to determine how likely I was to have a recurrence were like playing craps and we chose not to let a roll of the dice determine how I lived the rest of my life.

Yesterday, I went to see my Oncologist who had my results and they stated that I had a low risk of recurrence if I took the estrogen inhibitor for 5 years. “Good news! No chemo!” I didn’t have the heart to tell her there would be no chemo either way. My question is, if you had already decided that a bad “score” wouldn’t change your mind about the way you lived the rest of your life, could you be happy about a good “score”? My answer was, “I choose to take all good news as a good thing.”

Honestly, since my doctor uttered the terrible word CANCER, everything else has gone rather smoothly. I am healing fast from the surgery. There is no sign of Lymphodema. The Oncotype Score was low. The pathology report showed no lymph node involvement and no cancer in the right breast at all. ALL GOOD NEWS!

But the bus analogy goes both ways, even though my Cancer is under control and I’m ready for the next step (new boobs), I can’t guarantee that I won’t get run over by a bus tomorrow. I choose not to worry about busses. I choose to live my life. I choose to say that I am a three time Cancer Survivor. I choose to have the next two reconstruction surgeries so I feel more whole again.  I choose to take this all as good news and slap a smile on my face and give thanks to my angels who keep a close watch over me.