[Issues involving breast cancer management in Senegal: a cross-sectional study]

At a time when innovative therapies in breast cancer multiply, poorer countries such as Senegal are still lag far behind in the overall management of this type of cancer. In Senegal, although the treatment of advanced breast cancer is now well codified, survival and morbidity outcomes are still mediocre in view of diagnostic delays and of sometimes expensive and poorly tolerated mutilating treatments become necessary. With respect to advanced cancers, the challenges will lie in building of palliative care centres and in developing multidisciplinary approaches to improve quality of life and to support patients. On the other hand, with respect to preclinical or potentially curable cancers, the challenges are immense given the importance of early detection, localisation and diagnosis (stereotactic or ultrasound guided biopsy) but also of precision surgery and of complete resection (indexing - excision ensuring a margin of healthy tissue and specimen radiograph) while minimizing complications such as those of classic dissection (sentinel lymph node biopsy). Our health structures are not always prepared to achieve these goals. This is a situational analysis of the contextual obstacles that still exist and add a burden on the overall management of breast cancer in Senegal.