Recurrent operable breast cancer following incomplete mastectomy

Forty patients have been treated with recurrent operable breast cancer after having undergone procedures less extensive than modified radical mastectomy as a treatment of the primary, with or without radiation therapy. Initial pathology was invasive cancer in 21 patients, and treatment (excision or simple mastectomy, with or without radiation therapy) has been offered as the treatment of choice. Completion of radical mastectomy was done here in 30 patients, extended radical mastectomy in 3, and local excision in 7. Eleven received postoperative radiation therapy. The overall 5-year survival rate from the time of treatment, free of disease, was 40 per cent, and the 10-year survival rate was 20 per cent. If initial treatment included radiation therapy, survival was improved (12/25 vs 4/15 having no radiation therapy). Axillary nodal involvement was extensive, with 13 patients having positive level III nodes. Such patients should be followed closely in order to detect recurrence earlier. Adjuvant radiation therapy and chemotherapy trials post mastectomy should be evaluated in the hope of improving survival.