Iram Bokhari, Zahid Mehmood, Mehvish Nazeer, Asadullah Khan.
Early complications of mastectomy with axillary clearance in patients with stage II and #III carcinoma breast.
J Surg Pak Jan ;15(4):180-5.

Objective To evaluate the pattern early complications following mastectomy with axillary clearance for stage II and III carcinoma of breast. Study design Descriptive study. Place & Duration of study Surgical Ward-3, Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Centre, Karachi, from January 2009 to December 2009. Methodology This study included 100 female patients who underwent mastectomy with axillary clearance for stage II and III carcinoma of breast. Postoperative complications were recorded on a proforma. All patients were followed in the Breast Clinic for one month. Results The average age of the patients was 47.32 + 13.53 years. TNM staging revealed tumor size of more than 5 cms in most (60%) of the cases. Palpable lymph nodes were present in 72 % of the patients. None of the patients showed evidence of metastasis. The biopsy report was infiltrating ductal carcinoma in all except in two patients in whom biopsy turned out to be mucinous adenocarcinoma. Seroma formation was the most common complication that occurred in 38 (38%) patients. Oedema of arm was observed in 2 (2%), wound infection occurred in 12 (12%), haematoma in 4 (4%), skin flap necrosis in 6 (6%) and necrosis of the rotation flap was in two patients. Conclusions Seroma formation was the most common complication. Other complications were wound infection, flap necrosis and lymphoedema.

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