Radical mastectomy in the treatment of breast cancer a follow-up study over ten and fifteen years

Four hundred and two radical mastectomies have been followed up over a minimum period of 10 years. Postoperative radiotherapy was used only in cases with histologically proved glandular metastasis. The operation mortality was 1.5 per cent; crude survival rate, 44.8 per cent; deaths from other causes, 8.5 per cent; and cancer recurrence rate, 45 per cent. A 15‐year follow‐up of patients treated before 1955 has shown a further 5.6 per cent of late recurrences. Local recurrence, apart from generalized metastasis, has proved extremely rare in this series.