Tip:
Highlight text to annotate it
X
You may have heard a bit in the news about Angelina Jolie
and the surgery that she decided to undertake.
So she carries a gene mutation, BRCA1
gene mutation, and she decided because of her
high risk of development of breast cancer over her lifestime that she would undergo
prophylactic or double mastectomy surgery with
reconstruction. That is something we do offer at
Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre together with our breast surgery team.
There are many options for women who do carry
BRCA1 or 2 gene mutation and there
is in fact a high risk breast screening clinic as well at the Louise Temerty
Breast Cancer Centre, so that undergoing imaging
surveillance may be one option that these women decide to take. Another option
may be for chemoprevention, which entails taking
drug therapies that can also lower their risk. And then finally
the one that has come to light in the media more often now is about preventative
surgery. This is definitely something that can be undertaken but
should not be undertaken lightly as there are major decisions that need to be made
with this. There are the decisions about the type of reconstruction
whether to pursue with an implant based reconstruction or
whether to use a tissue based reconstruction, and once again these are things your
health care team needs to discuss with you if you decide to pursue this route.
Another clinic that has just been opened up at the Louise Temerty
Breast Cancer Centre here at Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre
is the immediate prophylactic mastectomy reconstruction clinic.
We do have a limited capacity to see women who are considering
surgery options, and that would involve the breast surgeon
as well as a plastic surgeon seeing the woman at the same time
and helping them to decide if these options are right for them.