Hi everyone.
So finished chemo 4 weeks ago and the treatment plan was always to do 15 sessions of radiotherapy afterwards. I am due to start next Thursday.
At my last oncology appointment I raised the question about reconstruction (I had a mastectomy). My surgeon at the time said to bear in mind that if I had radiotherapy then I would not be able to have implant reconstruction (they think I can’t have diep flap reconstruction as I’m very slim). I did a lot of research and found that some people have a tissue expander put in before radiotherapy then after radiotherapy that is removed and a proper implant put in. I mentioned that to the oncologist (as no one had mentioned tissue expanders to me before) and he said he would take it to the board and get back to me.
The oncologist rang me today and he said he spoke in the MDT meeting to all the other doctors and surgeons and on looking at my CT scan they don’t think I’d have a good outcome from implants after radiotherapy and they would fail. He has therefore done an urgent referral to onco plastics to assess me for diep flap surgery with the hope of making a decision whether I can proceed with that in 2 years and if not whether I would want implant surgery and no radiotherapy.
I know no one here can tell me whether to proceed with radiotherapy or not as it’s an individual choice but has anyone else encountered this? Did anyone not do radiotherapy?
The following comments were made by my oncologist today:-
1. New research has shown that radiotherapy should just be given to node positive patients (I only had 1 sentinel node effected and axillary nodes were all clear).
2. Radiotherapy has a small chance of causing a secondary cancer and given I am brca 2 positive it could trigger cancer in my other breast as the other breast will get a small amount of radiation to it.
So now I’m in a predicament. I would never choose vanity over health. I want to live a long healthy life free of cancer and would not sacrifice that to have boobs. However, I’m now thinking is radiotherapy worth it? Surely the chemotherapy has killed anything in my body. What is the benefit of radiotherapy after chemo. Surely it should have been given before chemo and after surgery to kill anything left over cells then. Will I be unhappy living with no boobs for the rest of my life (my other needs to be removed due to brca2 gene).
Any thoughts? Really don’t know what to do.
