Mastectomy from the perspective of a medical oncologist

An increasing awareness of breast cancer and the increased use of mammography fortunately is resulting in a marked increase in the diagnosis of early breast cancer. Many of these lesions are characterized by intraductal breast cancer (ductal carcinoma in situ) and/or lesions smaller than 1 cm. Before the era of mammography, approximately 3-5% of new breast cancer cases involved ductal carcinomas in situ. More recent series suggest that such lesions can account for up to 25% of all new breast cancer cases. Breast conservation therapy is of particular importance to this population of patients with breast cancer. Breast conservation therapy is defined as excision of the primary breast tumor and adjacent breast tissue followed by radiation. This is referred to as lumpectomy, tumorectomy, segmental mastectomy, and quadrantectomy. Surgeons have participated in a series of clinical studies which that provided us with the progressive concept that breast cancer is not only a local but a systemic disease. These studies have shown that a modified radical mastectomy is as effective as a radical or extended radical mastectomy for the management of breast cancer. Subsequently, patients with Stage I or II breast cancer, in which the tumor size was 4 cm or smaller, appeared to do equally well when treated with either total mastectomy or lumpectomy with radiation therapy. Lumpectomy followed by radiation therapy resulted in a 5-year survival rate of 85%, compared with 76% for total mastectomy. The probability of a radiated breast remaining free of tumor at 8 years after the operation was 90%, compared to 61% for those who did not receive radiation therapy after lumpectomy. Subsequent observations indicate that lumpectomy followed by breast radiation and adjuvant chemotherapy in women with positive nodes was appropriate treatment for Stages I and II breast cancer. This manuscript describes the contraindications and indications for conservative surgery for breast cancer and the role or perioperative chemotherapy. Improved imaging techniques will allow clinicians to diagnose breast cancer at an earlier stage of its evolution and demand even more stringent conservation approaches to its management. Simple or total mastectomy and lumpectomy with radiation therapy remain viable options for the management of patients with early stage breast cancer.