Utility of radiotherapy for the management of local tumor progression in patients with early breast cancer

Abstract

The generally accepted standard in early breast cancer surgery today is breast-conserving surgery with external beam radiation therapy, which is comparable in results to previously widely performed radical mastectomy and even has an advantage in terms of overall survival and control. Until now, there are areas of discussion and a number of questions remain related to the methodology of irradiation of patients with breast cancer, namely: is it advisable to irradiate the axillary zone after radical resection for early breast cancer? Does irradiation of axillary lymph nodes provide regional control comparable to lymphadenectomy, and whether it can be an alternative to lymph node dissection? Whether provides an irradiation of axillary lymph nodes comparable with regional lymph node dissection the control over patients with a positive sentry lymph node? A lot of studies have been published so far, answers to questions derived from what we present in this work.

Keywords

• breast cancer
• organ-preserving surgery
• radiation therapy
• axillary lymph nodes
• regional lymph node dissection