[Mammography after breast preserving therapy and reconstruction. Experiences in routine practice]

In the last few years we have seen, in daily routine, many different methods of operation and their complications. We want to show several diagnostical difficulties. Between January 1995 and July 1996 we evaluated all our patients retrospectively. They were treated by several methods of operation. The women were examined with the routine possibilities such as mammography, sonography, fine needle biopsy, and clinical examination. We examined 161 patients in the last 18 months. They were treated by breast-conserving therapy (127 women) and augmentation (34 women) at the age of 29-82 (O 55 years). We listed complications as well as early and late recurrences. The time after operation was 1/2-22 years. In our long-term experience we found fewer recurrences after breast-conserving treatment when the women also received radiation too (only operation 16%, operation and radiation 7.6%). For the future it is hoped to eliminate local recurrences by new operation methods (augmentation plasty with flaps, TEM flaps). Two patients with local recurrence are still alive after 22 years, so that not only local diagnosis and state of nodes are important also the individual immune reaction.