Efficiency of postoperative radiation in carcinoma of the breast. A comparison between two methods.

The results of simple mastectomy and postoperative irradiation of the chest wall and the regional lymph nodes in a series of 256 patients with primary carcinoma of the breast (between 1970 and 1972) were compared with those in a series of 155 patients (from 1963 to 1965) treated with radical mastectomy and postoperative irradiation of the regional lymph nodes. A statistically significant difference (p less than 0.01) was found between the chest wall recurrences in the group of patients with irradiation of the chest wall and the group without. No evidence indicates that routine postoperative irradiation should be harmful. Distant metastases in the 1970--1972 group were less frequent (13%) than in the 1963--1965 group (29%)9 The age-corrected 4-year survival rates for stages I and II were 83 per cent for the 1970--1972 group and 78 for the 1963--1965 group. The age-corrected 10-year survival rates for states I and II were 60 per cent.