A century of breast cancer surgery

Presented are three consecutive breast cancer series totaling 1912 women, treated by three generations of surgeons. All operations were done in one institution over the last 100 years. Most of the early patients underwent radical mastectomy. The 673 patients in the last series were treated by an assortment of different modalities, reflecting the changing therapeutic concepts of the past 25 years. This report is primarily an historical account showing the improvement in operating conditions and survival figures. Of greater scientific significance is the collection of 50 patients with late-appearing metastases (more than 10 years postoperatively) as well as a group of long-surviving patients with advanced stage II disease.