CA: A Cancer Journal for Clinicians, Vol 19, 282-288, Copyright
© 1969 by American Cancer Society
Chest-Wall Resection for Locally Recurrent Breast Cancer
Arthur F. Snyder M.D.1,
George M. Farrow M.D.2,
James K. Masson M.D.3, and
W. Spencer Payne M.D.4
1 Associate Surgeon, Department of Surgery, Geisinger Medical Center, Danville, Pennsylvania.
2 Consultant in Surgical Pathology, Mayo Clinic and Mayo Foundation, and Instructor in Pathology, Mayo Graduate School of Medicine, University of Minnesota, Rochester, Minnesota.
3 Consultant in Plastic Surgery, Mayo Clinic and Mayo Foundation, and Assistant Professor of Plastic Surgery, Mayo Graduate School of Medicine, University of Minnesota.
4 Consultant in Surgery, Mayo Clinic and Mayo Foundation, and Assistant Professor of Surgery, Mayo Graduate School of Medicine, University of Minnesota.
The effects of various forms of therapy in patients who had recurrent carcinoma of the breast clinically localized to the chest wall when they were first seen were analyzed. Most patients whose local recurrence developed less than four years after mastectomy died within two years regardless of the type of therapy used in their management. Among patients who had their initial local recurrence 4 years or more after mastectomy, 46 percent of those who underwent chest-wall resection and 23 percent of those treated by other means survived 5 years after local recurrence. Four patients survived 9 to 13 years after chest-wall resection without further evidence of carcinoma of the breast. In all other patients, disseminated disease developed. These data indicate that chest-wall resection may result in control of disease and prolongation of life in selected patients having their first local recurrence four years or more after mastectomy.
