Surgical treatment is one of the main treatments for breast cancer, especially for early breast cancer, surgery is an important way to achieve a cure. There are two main surgical methods commonly used in clinical practice: breast improvement radical surgery (removal of breast + axillary lymph node dissection) and breast preservation radical surgery (partial resection and retention of breast + axillary lymph node dissection).
In the past 20 years, after a large number of clinical group studies, breast preservation surgery and postoperative radiation therapy for early breast cancer have shown the same safety and effectiveness compared with traditional radical surgery. What kind of patients can undergo breast preservation surgery? Generally speaking: A single tumor, generally no more than 3cm in diameter, the larger tumor can be reduced by preoperative chemotherapy or endocrine therapy to obtain the opportunity for breast preservation surgery. At the same time, patients with diffuse calcification and contraindications to radiotherapy need to be excluded.
Sentinel lymph node biopsy is a breakthrough in the field of breast cancer surgery in recent years. Its purpose is to hope that through sentinel lymph node biopsy, breast cancer with negative axillary lymph nodes will be exempted from axillary lymph node dissection. In the past century, the treatment of breast cancer has undergone radical surgery, expanded radical surgery, improved radical surgery, and breast preservation surgery. At the same time, breast reconstruction after breast cancer surgery has also become one of the choices for patients.
Today, breast cancer patients can sit with surgeons, discuss treatment options, and choose the most suitable one from the different options. Radical surgery is also or will be replaced by breast preservation surgery. The effect of surgery in the treatment of breast cancer has not been weakened but is developing in a more reasonable direction.