Salvage surgery for recurrence after breast conservation.

Breast conservation surgery and radiation therapy are chosen with increasing frequency in breast cancer management. In addition to the risk of developing a contralateral malignancy, these women are at risk for local recurrence or a new primary lesion in the conserved breast. Most of these ipsilateral recurrences can be treated successfully with salvage mastectomy. The prognosis with salvage mastectomy depends on several factors, including the method of diagnosis of the recurrent tumor, the size of the recurrence, the extent of breast involvement at recurrence, the time interval from initial surgery to recurrence, the involvement of axillary nodes at the initial diagnosis and at the time of recurrence, and the histopathology of the recurrent tumor.