Reducing axillary surgery in breast cancer

This article provides a brief account of the recent evolution of the highly controversial surgical management of the positive axilla in patients with breast cancer, an issue still open to disparate surgical procedures. This short review highlights the reports that supply the rationale for current trends in reducing the aggressiveness of this surgery and discusses the course of the trials still in progress pointing in the same direction, thus supporting the principle of not performing axillary lymph node dissection for staging purposes alone.