[Post operative complications after neoadjuvant systemic therapy in primary breast cancer treatment - Case-control...

The use of neoadjuvant systemic therapy (NST) for the primary breast cancer treatment has constantly increased. Initially used to improve breast-conserving surgery (BCS) rate as well as for patients with inflammatory or inoperable locally advanced breast cancer, today, NST is used as a test of chemosensitivity and predictive factor by assessing pathologic complete response. With the increasing use of NST, it is fundamental to establish if NST increases postoperative morbidity.. In our study, the postoperative complications associated with NST were examined. We analyzed the data obtained from patients undergoing treatment for breast cancer in a University Hospital between 2003-2014 in a case-control study. We selected 286 patients attributed to two groups according to the surgery type: Group A, 150 patients undergoing breast conserving surgery with axillary node dissection (75 cases after NST and 75 controls with surgery alone) and group B, 136 patients undergoing mastectomy with axillary node dissection (68 cases after NST and 68 controls). There was no statistically significant difference between both groups in post-operative recovery or the rates of complications: use of antibiotics, re-operation, hematoma, blood transfusion, healing problems, wound infection, lymphocele and lymphoedema. Our study supports the safety of NST and suggests that it is not associated with increased morbidity in the patients undergoing breast surgery as BSC or mastectomy with axillary node dissection.