Joan was taking a shower when he discovered he had a lump in her breast. They did not give too much importance and even spent several months until he decided to go to the doctor for a look. That was when he was diagnosed “with metastatic breast carcinoma” was the official name. Breast cancer.

The year was 1981. Joan is now 62, and is perfect. Its revisions have been distanced in time and simply go to the doctor once a year to verify that the tumor does not recur. “The doctor says he would not even need to go, but I do it for my own peace of mind”, he says, adding with humor “at my age I have to watch my cholesterol, prostate … so a revision means nothing. ”

In the U.S. press this week echoed the case of Senator Edward Broke, who has just published his illness. Yes, he too was surprised by the diagnosis. «Breast Cancer? “Me?”. Yes, men can get breast cancer, but statistically your chances are much lower than those of women. Between 0.5 and 1.5 women per hundred cases or so. That is, more or less, for every hundred female patients, a single man.

Although the symptoms, treatment and outcome of the disease are exactly like those of women, the majority of men suffering from this disease as something discovered later, when malignant cells have already spread outside the breast tissue. The reasons are simple, no man thinks he can get this disease, traditionally attributed exclusively female, and many go to the doctor when several months have passed since the appearance of first symptoms. Therefore, the cancer is often already more advanced than women.

This may give the wrong impression that men die more, but the statistics indicate that survival is similar, the differences can only be measured according to the stage where the cancer. According to the American Cancer Society, each year about 1,500 diagnosed cases of cancer among men, of whom about 400 die. In front of them, an estimated 40,000 of the 211,000 new cases detected in women end up in death. In Spain, according to the National Institute of Statistics, in 2000, 55 men died of this disease, compared with 5677 women.

The incidence of breast cancer in men has increased in recent years with larger tumors and more aggressive growth than in women, according to a study released today at the website of the journal “Cancer.”

According to Sharon Giordano, professor of breast oncology at the University of Texas and author of the research, the increase was from 0.86 per 100,000 men in 1973 to 1.08 in 1998.

The oncologist says that the research results also indicate that breast cancer in men is biologically different from women.

“Breast cancer in men is rare (less than one percent of all cancer of this type) or about 1,600 new cases in the U.S. in 2004,” said Sharon.

The researcher said that “even with this small effect men should remain alert to the possibility that the disease affects them.”

With information provided by the National Cancer Institute, Giordano examined 2524 cases of cancer in men and 380,856 women. When compared to women, researchers found that men with breast cancer had higher mean age, 67 years vs. 62 years for women.

In addition, the disease had been discovered at an advanced stage when the cancer was gone to his lymph nodes.

“It’s ironic that tumors in men are easier to detect than in women. However, the disease is discovered them in a more advanced stage than in females,” said the oncologist.

Dr. Giordano said that in many cases, to detect growth, involve men experiencing a benign condition called gynecomastia, is an atypical growth of breast tissue that affects one third of men at some stage in his life, especially in adolescence.

The most common types of breast cancer in men are invasive ductal or unclassified carcinomas (93.4 percent) and papillary carcinoma, the study said.