Abstract:Background and Aims: Immediate breast reconstruction after mastectomy for breast cancer has become an important method of breast cancer surgical techniques, since it does not affect the treatment effect, and meanwhile, it can significantly improve the patients’ quality of life. Compared to other breast surgeries, mastectomy with reconstruction is more difficult to perform and time-consuming, so most breast cancer patients who need reconstruction are admitted to inpatient department for surgery and are properly observed for several days after operation. Here, the authors present the experience of 14 cases of breast cancer undergoing same-day immediate breast reconstruction in West China Hospital and discussed its safety and patients’ satisfaction.
Methods: The clinical data of 14 women with breast cancer undergoing same-day skin-sparing mastectomy surgery and immediate implant-based breast reconstruction from April 2020 to October 2020 in West China Hospital were reviewed. The data concerning doctor-patient requirement, surgical procedure, surgical safety, postoperative patients’ satisfaction and cautions for same-day reconstruction surgery were analyzed.
Results: The 14 patients had an average age of 42.6 years, and most of them were diagnosed as invasive breast cancer. The same-day skin-sparing mastectomy for breast cancer and immediate prosthetic breast reconstruction was successfully performed in all patients, including 10 cases of endoscopic reconstruction and 4 cases of open reconstruction. The operative time ranged from 146 to 215 min. During postoperative follow-up period for 3 to 9 months, no serious complications occurred, and only minor complications occurred in two patients, including one case of mild ischemia of flap and one case of seroma, and were all resolved after observation. According to Harris standard, the patients' satisfaction with the reconstructed breast were all expressed as excellent or good on postoperative 3 months. The BREAST-Q scores before and 3 months after operation were 62.2 and 59.6 for breast satisfaction, 59.9 and 51.0 for sexual well-being, 71.5 and 67.9 for psychosocial well-being, and 59.5 and 60.0 for physical well-being (chest), respectively.
Conclusion: Same-day skin-sparing mastectomy surgery with immediate prosthetic breast reconstruction on the basis of the routine breast cancer day surgery can obtain the same safety and satisfaction as inpatients, alleviate the hospitalization stress to a certain extent, increase the utilization rate of medical resources, and reduce the medical costs. So, it may have a broad application prospect.