The sonographic appearance of the irradiated breast

A dedicated supine breast ultrasound scanner was used to perform 48 bilateral breast sonograms on 21 patients who had undergone segmental resection and radiation therapy for breast cancer. Skin thickening was seen in 13 of 21 patients (62%). There was an increased echogenicity of the fat in 13 patients (62%) and poor definition of Cooper's ligaments in nine patients (43%). Fifteen patients (71%) had decreased compressibility and 8 (38%) had decreased penetration of the sound beam into the breast. The radiation changes were seen as early as one month after the completion of radiotherapy and improved by one year in the majority of patients studied with sequential sonograms.