OUTPATIENT DEFINITIVE BREAST-CANCER SURGERY

We attempted to show that surgical treatment of breast cancer, includi ng axillary lymph node dissection with or without concomitant partial mastectomy (ALND), simple mastectomy (SM), and modified radical mastec tomy (MRM) can be performed safely in an outpatient setting. The recor ds of 100 consecutive women undergoing definitive breast cancer surger y by the authors between August 1994 and July 1996 were retrospectivel y reviewed. Average age was 54 +/- 10 years. Fifty patients were disch arged the day of surgery, 44 were hospitalized, and 6 remained 2 or mo re days postoperatively. Outpatients were more likely to have undergon e ALND or SM (42 versus 23 procedures) and more often completed surger y in the morning (36 versus 12); P < 0.05. Eight patients of 35 with M RM were discharged the same day. One patient was readmitted with a wou nd infection. There were no major complications or deaths. Ninety-four per cent of patients were discharged within 23 hours of surgery; half were discharged the same day. No complications occurred in outpatient s, and there were no readmissions. For patients admitted overnight no complications were detected during the overnight hospital stay. In con clusion, breast cancer surgery, from ALND to SM or MRM, can be safely and comfortably performed on an outpatient basis.