Breast Reconstruction After Mastectomy: A Survey of Surgeons' and Patients' Perceptions

Exploring a method for extracting concerns of multiple breast cancer patients in the domain of patient narratives using BERT and its optimization by domain adaptation using masked language modeling

Narratives posted on the internet by patients contain a vast amount of information about various concerns. This study aimed to extract multiple concerns from interviews with breast cancer patients using the natural language processing (NLP) model bidirectional encoder representations from transformers (BERT). A total of 508 interview transcriptions of breast cancer patients written in Japanese were labeled with five types of concern labels: "treatment," "physical," "psychological," "work/financial," and "family/friends." The labeled texts were used to create a multi-label classifier by fine-tuning a pre-trained BERT model. Prior to fine-tuning, we also created several classifiers with domain adaptation using (1) breast cancer patients' blog articles and (2) breast cancer patients' interview transcriptions. The performance of the classifiers was evaluated in terms of precision through 5-fold cross-validation. The multi-label classifiers with only fine-tuning had precision values of over 0.80 for "physical" and "work/financial" out of the five concerns. On the other hand, precision for "treatment" was low at approximately 0.25. However, for the classifiers using domain adaptation, the precision of this label took a range of 0.40-0.51, with some cases improving by more than 0.2. This study showed combining domain adaptation with a multi-label classifier on target data made it possible to efficiently extract multiple concerns from interviews.

Oncoplastic and reconstructive breast surgeon performance and impact on breast reconstructions: Clinical outcomes, learning curve, and patients' satisfaction

BACKGROUND

Compared to mastectomy alone, the addition of breast reconstruction could improve quality of life and it is usually performed by two-team approach, which consisted of both breast surgeons and plastic surgeons. This study aims to illustrate the positive impacts of the dual-trained oncoplastic reconstructive breast surgeon (ORBS) and reveal the factors influencing reconstruction rates.

METHODS

This retrospective study enrolled 542 breast cancer patients who undergone mastectomy with reconstruction performed by a particular ORBS between January 2011 and December 2021 at a single institution. Clinical and oncological outcomes, impact of case accumulation on performance and patient-reported aesthetic satisfactions were analyzed and reported. Furthermore, in this study 1851 breast cancer patients treated with mastectomy combined with or without breast reconstructions, which included 542 performed by ORBS, were reviewed to identify factors affecting breast reconstructions.

RESULTS

Among the 524 breast reconstructions performed by the ORBS, 73.6% were gel implant reconstructions, 2.7% were tissue expanders, 19.5% were transverse rectus abdominal myocutaneous (TRAM) flaps, 2.7% were latissimus dorsi (LD) flaps, 0.8% were omentum flaps, and 0.8% involved LD flaps and implants. There was no total flap loss in the 124 autologous reconstructions, and the implant loss rate was 1.2% (5/403). Patient-reported aesthetic evaluations showed that 95% of the patients were satisfied. As the ORBS's accumulated case experiences, the implant loss rate decreased, and the overall satisfaction rate increased. According to the cumulative sum plot learning curve analysis, it took 58 procedures for the ORBS to shorten the operative time. In multivariate analysis, younger age, MRI, nipple sparing mastectomy, ORBS, and high-volume surgeon were factors related to breast reconstruction.

CONCLUSION

The current study demonstrated that a breast surgeon after adequate training could become an ORBS and perform mastectomies with various types of breast reconstruction with acceptable clinical and oncological outcomes for breast cancer patients. ORBSs could increase breast reconstruction rates, which remain low worldwide.

Physicians' perception about the impact of breast reconstruction on patient prognosis: a survey in Japan

BACKGROUND

One barrier to the widespread use of breast reconstruction (BR) is physicians' perception that BR adversely affects breast cancer prognosis. However, there is limited information regarding physicians' understanding of the impact of BR on patient prognosis and which physicians have misunderstandings about BR.

METHODS

We conducted an e-mail survey regarding the impact of BR on the prognosis of patients with breast cancer among members of the Japanese Breast Cancer Society.

RESULTS

Of 369 respondents, 99 (27%) said that they believe BR affects patient prognosis. Female respondents and those who treat fewer new breast cancer patients per year were more likely to state that they believe BR affects patient prognosis (P = 0.006 and 0.007). Respondents who believed that BR affects patient prognosis underestimated 5-year overall survival rates in patients who receive BR and subsequently have local or regional recurrence in different sites.

CONCLUSION

Our survey demonstrated that a quarter of respondents believe that BR affects patient prognosis and underestimate survival rates in patients who receive BR and have subsequent local or regional recurrence. Because of the lack of evidence regarding the impact of BR on patient prognosis, educating physicians by providing accurate knowledge regarding BR and patient prognosis is highly recommended.

Immediate breast reconstruction uptake in older women with primary breast cancer: systematic review

BACKGROUND

Postmastectomy immediate breast reconstruction (PMIBR) may improve the quality of life of patients with breast cancer, of whom older women (aged 65 years or more) are a growing proportion. This study aimed to assess PMIBR in older women with regard to underlying impediments (if any).

METHODS

MEDLINE, Embase, and PubMed were searched by two independent researchers up to June 2022. Eligible studies compared PMIBR rates between younger and older women with invasive primary breast cancer.

RESULTS

A total of 10 studies (2012-2020) including 466 134 women were appraised, of whom two-thirds (313 298) were younger and one-third (152 836) older. Only 10.0 per cent of older women underwent PMIBR in contrast to 45.0 per cent of younger women. Two studies explored factors affecting uptake of PMIBR in older women; surgeon-associated (usual practice), patient-associated (socioeconomic status, ethnicity, and co-morbidities), and system-associated (insurance status and hospital location) factors were identified.

CONCLUSION

Uptake of PMIBR in older women is low with definable (and some correctable) barriers.

Barriers and facilitators to breast reconstruction in ethnic minority women-A systematic review

INTRODUCTION

Post-mastectomy breast reconstruction (PMBR) is an important component of the multidisciplinary care of breast cancer patients. Despite the improved quality of life, significant racial disparities exist in the receipt of PMBR. Given the increasing population of Black, Asian and minority ethnic (BAME) women in UK, it is important to address this disparity. Our review aims to identify the barriers and facilitators influencing the uptake of PMBR in BAME women and raise awareness for physicians on interventions that could improve uptake of PMBR in BAME women.

METHODS

The methodology outlined by the Cochrane guidelines was used to structure this systematic review. Systematic searches for qualitative studies on barriers and/or facilitators to PMBR in ethnic women published in English were conducted. The following databases were searched from their inception up to June 2019: MEDLINE, EMBASE, PubMed, Cochrane Library, Google Scholar and Scopus. Reference lists of all included articles and relevant systematic reviews were also hand-searched for possible additional publications. Publication year or status restrictions were not applied. Only full text articles published in English and by peer reviewed journals are included. Exclusion criteria were as follows: quantitative studies on barriers and/or facilitators to PMBR, abstracts, conference proceedings, non-English language and non-specific to BAME women. A thematic synthesis approach was used through the development of sub-themes and themes from the findings of the included qualitative studies.

RESULTS

Five studies satisfied the inclusion and exclusion criteria. Three overarching themes emerged from our review: physician-associated factors (physician recommendations), patient-associated factors (knowledge, language, community and cultural, emotions, logistics, patient characteristics) and system-associated factors (insurance coverage, income status).

CONCLUSION

Our systematic review suggests that there is a paucity of data in the literature on the barriers and facilitators to PMBR in BAME women. Considering the expanding population of BAME women and increasing breast cancer incidence, it is imperative that future research in this field is carried out. Physician and patient-associated factors were identified as the most important yet modifiable factors. Adopting a combination of culturally tailored interventions targeting these factors may help improve the access of PMBR in BAME women.

REGISTRATION

Prospero ID: CRD42019133233.

Factors associated with the desire to undergo post-mastectomy breast reconstruction in a Mexican breast cancer center

PURPOSE

To assess the proportion of breast cancer patients treated with total mastectomy who are interested in undergoing breast reconstruction, the factors associated with their desire to undergo this procedure, and the motives stated for their decision.

METHODS

Women with stage I-III breast cancer, public health insurance, and history of total mastectomy treated at a center in Monterrey, Mexico, were invited to answer a series of questionnaires regarding their clinical and demographic characteristics, information received about breast reconstruction, body image, and relationship satisfaction.

RESULTS

A total of 100 patients were interviewed, of which 68% desired to undergo breast reconstruction. Only 35% recalled talking about this procedure with a physician and 85% claimed not to have enough information to make an informed decision. Those who desired breast reconstruction were younger (p < 0.001), more likely to be in a relationship (p = 0.025), and had a higher probability of having talked to a physician about the procedure (p = 0.019). Furthermore, they felt less sexually attractive (p < 0.001), more deformed (p = 0.006), and less feminine (p = 0.005) since the mastectomy. The main motives to undergo this procedure were to have breast symmetry and greater freedom on which clothes to wear, while the main deterrent was the high economical cost.

CONCLUSIONS

Insufficient information about the procedure and high economical cost were identified as potential barriers to undergo breast reconstruction. The findings of this study emphasize the pressing need to optimize patient care by providing information in a standardized manner and improving access to breast reconstruction within the Mexican public healthcare system.