Advice

Hello .mel28  I've been looking into various margin definitions due to a few queries relating to my pathology report. It can vary from hospital to hospital but at mine they like to have a margin of at least 1mm cancer free tissue around the edge of a tumour when it is removed. The deep margin is closest to the chest wall and the lateral margin is to the side. If a margin is described as 'clear' it means that it is more than 1mm away from the excision margin and there is cancer free tissue. If a margin is described as 'involved' it means that the tumour is less than 1mm from the margin. I had a lumpectomy and because some of my margins were not clear they need to go back in and remove more tissue from those particular areas to ensure that all of the cancer cells have been removed. Not sure if that helps or not but your oncologist will be able to confirm the actual position (and explain it better than I can!) x