www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2008-10/uoc--slf100208. -
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Published on: 10/2/2008
Last Visited: 10/2/2008
"We were surprised to find that so many women in our study — almost a quarter of them — had received another lumpectomy rather than a mastectomy," said Steven Chen, a UC Davis Cancer Center surgical oncologist and lead author of the study, which appears in the October issue of the American Journal of Surgery."It's likely that patients are asking for lumpectomies when their cancer is diagnosed a second time, and their doctors are simply complying with that request.Whatever the reason, that decision can shorten life spans."
Chen and study co-author, Steve Martinez, also a UC Davis Cancer Center surgical oncologist, gathered data from the National Cancer Institute's Surveillance, Epidemiology and End Results database, which includes information on all cancers diagnosed in selected regions throughout the nation.
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Chen explained that a mastectomy is the generally accepted surgical treatment for a second cancer because whole breast radiation, which typically accompanies a lumpectomy, is not usually recommended twice in a lifetime.