There are a number of procedures designed to treat breast cancers.
If you have discovered a lump in or on your breast, the next step is diagnosis. Your doctor will have a mammography, magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), breast biopsy or ultrasound taken to examine the lump. If your are diagnosed with cancer, then surgery may be necessary. There are a number of different breast cancer surgeries, but all of them use the same basic tools, such as anesthetic, a scalpel, retractors, drain tubes and sutures.
Anesthetic
Anesthetic causes numbness and a lack of awareness, making it possible to operate on someone who is "under" anesthetic without hurting them. There are two types of anesthetic. Local anesthetic causes numbness in one part of the body. It is applied in a number of ways, including to the skin in cream or gel form, and by injection. A general anesthetic puts the patient to sleep and is usually administered in gas form or by injection.
Scalpel
A scalpel is a steel instrument that is used to make incisions and cuts. While traditional scalpels have a convex blade fixed to the handle, modern examples have a number of detachable blades to be used for different purposes. In the case of breast cancer surgery, one scalpel blade will be used to make an incision in the skin, and another to separate the tumor or the breast from the surrounding tissue. An electrosurgical scalpel severs tissue using an electrically heated wire. This causes less bleeding, as the heat closes the wound as soon as it is made.
Retractors
Retractors are curved instruments used to hold tissue aside during surgery. In breast cancer surgery, retractors are used to hold the incision open so that the tumor or breast tissue can be removed.
Drainage Tube
A drainage tube is a tube that is inserted into an incision after surgery in order to draw fluids away from the wound and allow it to heal more quickly. Drainage tubes may be necessary for up to a week after most breast cancer surgeries, and your doctor will attach them to an easily portable, pocket-sized suction device that drains off the fluids in the wound. You will be taught maintain the particular suction device with which your doctor supplies you.
Suture
A suture can be made of a number of different materials and is used to stitch the incisions made during breast cancer surgery. You body tissue eventually will dissolve some types of sutures, while others need to be removed later; some are made deep in the wound so that they cannot be seen on the surface, while a doctor makes others on the skin. After breast cancer surgery, your surgeon will use sutures to close the incision on your breast and in your armpit on the same side if the lymph nodes there also needed to be removed, as is often the case due to infection with the cancer.
Tags: breast cancer, breast cancer surgery, cancer surgery, breast cancer, breast cancer surgeries
