Thailand develops new technique of breast cancer surgery

BANGKOK, August 23 (TNA) - Thailand, through Bangkok-based Siriraj Hospital, has introduced a new technique of breast cancer surgery, which includes simultaneous radiotherapy. Associated Professor Dr. Adul Ratanavijitrasilp, a surgery lecturer of the Faculty of Medicine, Siriraj Hospital, told a press conference on the development on Friday. Dr. Adul said, in the past, whole breasts had to be removed in breast cancer surgery, but at present, only cancerous tumors are removed and patients maintain the appearance of their femininity. However, breast cancer can return with the technique and patients must, thus, undergo 25-30 rounds of radiotherapy during a period of 5-6 weeks after the surgery. With the newly-developed technique, Dr. Adul acknowledged, a patient receives accurate radiotherapy just after her cancerous tumor is removed and it reduces the rounds of radiotherapy by about 20. Some sentinel lymph nodes are also removed. According to the doctor, about 50 patients have been treated with the new technique at Siriraj Hospital since 2011 and breast cancer has returned to only one of them. The repeated cancer rate is, thus, at two percent. Assist Prof Dr. Suebwong Juthapisit, a surgeon applying the new technique, noted that it has been applied to more than 2,000 patients in Britain and Italy for over a decade, and that patients treated with the new technique must be 55 years old and over, have only one contained cancerous tumor, suffer the early stage of breast cancer and invasive mammary carcinoma with a cancerous tumor of two centimeters in size and have estrogen receptors in cancerous cells. Patients can use their health welfare to pay for the surgery, but they must pay 38,000 baht for the simultaneous radiotherapy by themselves. (TNA)