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Vital Signs: Male Breast Cancer

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October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month. Numerous stories on the subject mostly focus on women. Men also get breast cancer, but their lack of awareness about that often has serious consequences. Dr. Roshni Rao of UT Southwestern Medical Center talked (with KERA’s Sam Baker) about male breast cancer in this installment of Vital Signs.

Four Things To Know About Male Breast Cancer:

  • Male breast cancer is cancer that forms in the breast tissue of men. Though breast cancer is most commonly thought of as a woman’s disease, male breast cancer does occur.
  • Male breast cancer is most common in older men, though male breast cancer can occur at any age.
  • Men diagnosed with male breast cancer at an early stage have a good chance for a cure. Still, many men delay seeing their doctors if they notice unusual signs or symptoms, such as a breast lump. For this reason, many male breast cancers are diagnosed when the disease is more advanced.

-MayoClinic.com

Estimates for breast cancer in men in the United States for 2013 are:

  • About 2,240 new cases of invasive breast cancer will be diagnosed
  • About 410 men will die from breast cancer
  • Breast cancer is about 100 times less common among men than among women. For men, the lifetime risk of getting breast cancer is about 1 in 1,000. The number of breast cancer cases in men relative to the population has been fairly stable over the last 30 years.

-cancer.org (American Cancer Society)

For more information:

Sam Baker is KERA's senior editor and local host for Morning Edition. The native of Beaumont, Texas, also edits and produces radio commentaries and Vital Signs, a series that's part of the station's Breakthroughs initiative. He also was the longtime host of KERA 13’s Emmy Award-winning public affairs program On the Record. He also won an Emmy in 2008 for KERA’s Sharing the Power: A Voter’s Voice Special, and has earned honors from the Associated Press and the Public Radio News Directors Inc.