Team Gressa

About this campaign

We all recognize Gressa as one of the most generous, compassionate, caring, and loving people we all know. Let's show her how much we love those things (AND MORE) about her, by supporting her through this journey. Every little bit helps — we hope that these shirts can help with any medical expenses and show our support for our friend.

Diagnosis
Ductal carcinoma in-situ (DCIS) - Stage 0 - Grade III with comedonecrosis - high grade, poorly differentiated - ER-, PgR- (don't know the HER2 status yet, but likely no since they don't think it's invasive)

What does that mean, exactly?

• We caught it really early!
• It's in the milk ducts and likely hasn't spread.
• Hormone negative means it's more aggressive and will not respond to cancer-inhibiting drugs like Tamoxifen.
• "Comedo refers to areas of dead (necrotic) cancer cells, which build up inside the tumor. When cancer cells grow quickly, some cells don't get enough nourishment. These starved cells can die off, leaving areas of necrosis."
  
  As of now, we don't think there is any involvement of the lymph nodes or spread to other areas. That won't be confirmed until the big surgery and the full pathology results (where they biopsy the breast tissue and axillary/armpit lymph nodes.) But, because of the multiple tumors and area of involvement, a mastectomy will be required.
  
  That post-surgery pathology report will then determine whether radiation is needed, chemotherapy + radiation, or neither. Timing-wise, it's looking like the first surgery will likely be sometime in the next 2-4 weeks.