New diagnosis in the world: Breast cancer detected in a 7-year-old girl in Chile

Mauro he was only five years old when his mother Patricia noticed something strange in your body. It was after he bathed her, as he creamed her, that he saw what he called it “a little bean” under her nipple. A lump she knew wasn’t normal, but she never imagined it was a breast cancer.

your case is unique in the world and draws the attention of the international scientific community, which analyzes the detection and treatment of the disease in the child currently the youngest patient diagnosed to cross it.

“Breast Cancer Cases in children under 14 they are very scarce, almost nil, they are very rareyes, we talked about it 0.0001%we have no history because it is a unique case in the world”, explained the mastologist of the Clinical Hospital of the University of Chile, Mario Pardo to the EFE agency.

The girl was diagnosed last September after performing countless medical tests to find the cause that made that “bean” on his chest grow more and more.

The thing is the tumor was growingbut medical studies have required time and – beyond – professionals They did not consider it to be carcinogenic due to the absence of similar cases.

“They made a very long pilgrimage and at first the doctors didn’t believe what they saw, so they the delivery of the diagnosis took a long time”, commented to EFE Felipe Tagle, president of the Chilean Association of Cancer Patients, who accompanies the family on this journey.

Maura’s case is strange because she is a minor. However, too It has a peculiarity: it is triple negativewhich means that it has none of the three receptors (progesterone, estrogen and HER2 protein) where this tumor is normally found and which facilitate its treatment and evolution.

This is the main difference it has with the diagnosis closest to hers: that of a girl in the United States who was diagnosed with breast cancer at the age of 10. But this one doesn’t have that particular difficulty.

The treatment of little Maura, originally from Quillota, about 120 kilometers north of Santiago, the capital of Chile, led to a mastectomy operation -breast removal-.

Patricia Muñoz, his mother, said: “The nipple has grown a lot, sand it turned purple, it was like an egg. They operated on her in August and almost two months later they gave me the results of the biopsy, which they also reviewed in Santiago, and which said the girl had breast cancer.”

And he added: “It was devastating for the family. Everything was removed from my daughter, including a ganglion, and my fear is that this will appear in the other breast”, added the one who mobilized to make your daughter’s case known and ask for help to fight the disease.

The mother’s concern for her daughter’s future

Waiting for further results to decide what the next step will be, Maura’s mother says she investigates the Internet, informs herself and look for options regarding illness and treatmentbut points out that all the possibilities that arise “are related to adults”.

However, since the case became public, the family has received help from the Chilean Ministry of Health and does not rule out seeking international support and solutions.

Patricia points out that her big challenge is yet to come: “Now Maura doesn’t understand what is happening to her because she is a girl and says that she is only missing a boob when she sees herself without a nipple, but My biggest fear is not knowing how to explain what happened to him”, he admitted to EFE.

In Chile, the breast is the leading cause of cancer death in women just like in the world. However, it is a pathology of adult women, especially after the age of 50.

Although annual mammography is recommended in Chile from the age of 40, Felipe Tagle believes that cases like this demonstrate that “it should be bring forward the age of 25 years and, if there is a family history, much earlier”.