Excerpts from docguide.com Review: "In this study, 1,079 women with clinically negative axillary nodes underwent radical mastectomy, total mastectomy without axillary dissection but with postoperative irradiation, or total mastectomy plus axillary dissection only if their nodes became positive. A total of 586 women with clinically positive axillary nodes underwent either radical mastectomy or total mastectomy without axillary dissection but with postoperative irradiation. There were no significant differences among the three groups of women with negative nodes or between the two groups of women with positive nodes on a range of factors, including disease-free survival, relapse-free survival, distant-disease-free survival or overall survival. In women with negative nodes, hazard ratio for death among those treated with total mastectomy and radiation versus radical mastectomy was 1.08, and among those who had total mastectomy without radiation versus radical mastectomy was 1.03. Among women with positive nodes, hazard ratio for death in those who had total mastectomy and radiation versus radical mastectomy was 1.06. Although when this trial began, it was widely held that women who lived for five years free of disease were "cured" the current phase shows a substantial proportion of events occurred after five years among both women with negative and those with positive nodes. Twenty-five percent of all first distant recurrences and 50 percent of all contralateral breast cancers were detected after five years. This underlines the need for long-term follow-up, particularly in the evaluation of patients with a good prognosis, suggest these authors. Moreover, the authors conclude, their observation after 25 years of follow-up that 31 percent of patients died without a recurrence of breast cancer indicates the need for accurate information about the cause of death in women with long-term follow-up. " Copyright © 2002 P\S\L Consulting Group Inc. Remember we are NOT Doctors and have NO medical training. This site is like an Encylopedia - there are many pages, many links on many topics. Support our work with any size DONATION - see left side of any page - for how to donate. You can help raise awareness of CAM.