Breast cancer is common. In patients who have relatively larger breasts and smaller tumors, there may be several different options to treat the breast cancer from an oncologic perspective and there may be different options for reconstruction.
Patients who are candidates for breast conservation therapy tend to be patients who have smaller tumors relative to the overall size of the breast. Meaning-that when the tumor is removed but there is still a significant amount of breast tissue remaining to reconstruct the breast.
In some patients, the nipple areola complex might need to be removed during a lumpectomy. This often depends on the location of the tumor and it’s proximity to the nipple areola complex.
The pattern used to reconstruct the breast is the same pattern used for a standard breast reduction or mastopexy operation. A segment of the breast is removed and the nipple areola complex is kept viable based on the remaining blood supply. Often a second incision is made in the axillae for a sentinel lymph node biopsy. Ocassionally, the sentinel lymph node biopsy can be performed through the mastopexy/reduction pattern exposure.
