A 7-year-old Chilean girl is diagnosed with breast cancer, a rare case in the world

“But he never told me that this could happen,” Muñoz told local television.

A year later, in October 2022, after avoiding delays in public health care, a biopsy revealed the cancer. Two months later, about to turn seven, Maura had to undergo a mastectomy on her left breast.

“My daughter is mutilated, and that is the pain I have,” says Muñoz. “The only thing she has mentioned to me when I take her to the oncologist is that she doesn’t want to be bald, but beyond that she doesn’t understand that she doesn’t have her breast.”

His case is very rare in the world.

“Most women who have breast cancer are diagnosed between 50 and 60 (years old). From then on it starts to be less frequent, less frequent, less frequent. And a case in a child under seven years of age is completely anecdotal,” said Francisco Barriga, pediatric hematologist and oncologist at the Catholic University of Chile.

Maura’s family is now awaiting the results of post-operative tests because the next steps to treat someone her age are unclear at this time and her mother fears that the disease has spread.

Normally, if there are no metastases, people with cancer undergo a radiation process, but in Maura’s case there are no records due to her young age, said Felipe Tagle, president of the Chilean association of cancer patients who advises the family.

Tagle said that many people declined to take medical charge of this case because there was not enough information or experience in this regard.

“At a global level there is no case similar to Maura’s. The only case in which there is a record is a girl in the United States who was detected with a similar cancer at the age of 10 and it is one case in 200 million, Maura’s may be one by 400 million,” he said.

But now they have made contact with Spanish doctors who have more experience on the subject and are waiting to define the next steps.