Advancements in Breast Cancer Care

A diag­no­sis of breast can­cer comes with a range of emo­tions and deci­sions for patients. Dr. Chris­t­ian Zwick, of Quin­cy Med­ical Group, spe­cial­izes in the treat­ment of breast can­cer patients and pro­vides options that improve both the well-being and qual­i­ty of life for women seek­ing recon­struc­tive options.

“Our pri­ma­ry goal is to cure the patient of the can­cer,” Dr. Zwick explained. ​“We want to make this as seam­less as pos­si­ble for patients. It’s a tough time for them. I want there to be as lit­tle as pos­si­ble to remind them that they had breast can­cer in the first place. These pro­ce­dures help that vis­i­ble reminder go away, so that patients can get on with their lives and feel good about themselves. “

Dr. Zwick offers three pro­ce­dur­al options to patients. Each of the pro­ce­dures is fair­ly new to the region, and improves the cos­met­ic out­come asso­ci­at­ed with breast can­cer. These pro­ce­dur­al options include oncoplas­tic surgery, hid­den scar breast surgery, and skin and nip­ple spar­ing mas­tec­to­my. The method cho­sen depends on each patient’s cir­cum­stances and loca­tion of the breast tumor.

Oncoplas­tic surgery uti­lizes tech­niques that not only com­plete­ly remove the can­cer from the breast, but uti­lizes tis­sue rearrange­ment to lessen or negate the defor­mi­ty in the breast. Hid­den Scar Breast surgery is a tech­nique that Dr. Zwick has used for sev­er­al years now, and is uti­lized to hide scars and nat­ur­al lines present all over the body or in areas that are either not seen or are not as obvi­ous. Skin and Nip­ple Spar­ing Mas­tec­to­my allows patients requir­ing or choos­ing a mas­tec­to­my to pre­serve all of the skin includ­ing the nip­ple pro­vid­ing a bet­ter cos­met­ic out­come. This option typ­i­cal­ly involves imme­di­ate recon­struc­tion or replace­ment of the breast with an implant of some type.

In addi­tion to these pro­ce­dures, Dr. Zwick said many patients want to min­i­mize the pos­si­bil­i­ty of get­ting can­cer back in the breast where they had the can­cer, as well as the chance of it occur­ring in the oth­er breast. These patients have the option to do skin and nip­ple spar­ing mas­tec­to­my on the breast with can­cer, and risk reduc­ing mas­tec­to­my on the oth­er. ​“Patients want to take care of the prob­lem they have with a good cos­met­ic out­come so they can get on with their lives. This is cer­tain­ly some­thing we can offer them,” he said. ​“There’s no way that I or any­one else can take someone’s breast can­cer risk away com­plete­ly, but we can lessen it marked­ly, so it’s very unlike­ly to have breast can­cer come back or devel­op can­cer lat­er in life.”

There are also cer­tain con­di­tions that increase a person’s life­time risk of devel­op­ing breast can­cer, even though they don’t have breast can­cer yet. These patients may also choose to have surgery and recon­struc­tion before they have a chance to devel­op breast cancer.

Assist­ing Dr. Zwick with these pro­ce­dures is the uti­liza­tion of intra­op­er­a­tive ultra­sound to help local­ize the area of the breast can­cer, which allows for a more pre­cise approach. ​“This is very impor­tant in allow­ing me to obtain what is called a clear mar­gin,” he explained. ​“We need to be sure that all of the breast can­cer has been removed to ensure that it does not come back. The more cer­tain we are of these mar­gins, the less like­ly the patient will require more surgery.”

Quin­cy Med­ical Group takes a team approach in guid­ing patients through their treat­ment. Part­ner­ing with both the Plas­tic Surgery and Oncol­o­gy depart­ments at QMG, Dr. Zwick said patients can feel assured that their care is looked at from all angles. These pro­ce­dures are an advance­ment to breast can­cer treat­ment and offered right here in Quin­cy. ​“We want our patients to feel like there’s just no rea­son to be any­where else. We’ve got a great team here,” he said. ​“We can take care of every­thing right here. We want patients to be here where their fam­i­ly and sup­port mech­a­nism is. We want to keep it all here.