Category: Reconstructive Surgery - Page: 2

all cancers, whether breast, brain or blood, start when a single cell’s DNA gets a mutation or is damaged. This means that a normal gene, that produces a protein that goes on to provide a certain function, becomes abnormal. This abnormal gene produces an abnormal protein. Now our cells are really smart and there are other proteins that detect abnormal genes and remove them or even signal for the entire cell to be destroyed. However, it’s often these removing genes, known as tumor suppressor genes, that are abnormal…..

Like many cancers, the treatment for breast cancer has gone through its evolution.  Surgical treatment in the beginning and well into most of the 20th century consisted of the radical mastectomy.  This procedure involved removal of the breast, pectoralis major muscle and all of the lymph nodes of the axilla or armpit through a large…

Today I had a consultation with a lovely couple.  The wife and patient is a  31-year-old mother of two young children.  During a breast self-exam (which I hope all women do but know they don’t so do it) she noticed something very slightly different in one of her breasts.  She saw her doctor, who sent…

More than 240,000 women are subject to the realities of breast cancer each year. The physical after-affects of breast cancer can have a profound impact on a woman’s mental well being. However, there has been great strides made in how to treat this once deadly disease. Surgery is often recommended, and new methods that remove…