I had a mastectomy and Sentinel Node Biopsy almost two weeks ago, I got my histology results on Tuesday and the news wasn’t great. They had taken 9 lymph nodes and not just the Sentinel Nodes as when they went into the arm pit there were other nodes on top of the sentinel ones and they had to be removed in order to get the others out. This has turned out to be quite lucky as the sentinal nodes were clear of cancer but 2 of the others weren’t which the surgeon has labelled as a bit of a mystery. Has this happened to anyone else? The surgeon has said it is possible that the two affected nodes were once the Sentinel Nodes but they stopped acting in this way once they were became involved with the cancer.
This finding means I definitely have to have chemo and I am booked in for a Level 2 Axillary Clearance on 26th November, has anyone got any experience of having this done?? They have said that they will open up the scar from the first op to do this which makes me cringe as I’m very squeamish, lol.
I had my scar opened for the axillary node clearance and it’s healed just as well as the first time. It didn’t even hurt as much. In my SNB she took 3 nodes then only found another 4 when she did the clearance. Try not to think about it, you’ll be zonked out whilst they do it anyway so just happy positive thoughts.
Hope it goes well for you.
Em
Hi San,
I had SNB in Feb 08 and they removed two nodes. When I got the results, I was told that the sentinel was clear but the other wasn’t. I did query this with breast care nurse, and whilst I didn’t ever really get an answer that fully explained it to me (I always thought sentinel was first, so if it was clear, others would be fine), it was confirmed that it was right enough. The good news was that full clearance revealed no further infected nodes - I hope your case is similar!
As for reopening the scar, don’t worry as you won’t know about it. Mine was fine and healed pretty quickly. It does mean that you’ll only have one scar rather than two, so hopefully less issues? All the best,
Ax
Well, this is scary! I had a WLE and SNB and they only removed the one sentinel node, which was clear. From what you are saying, there could be others that aren’t. If that’s the case, there are lots of people being given incorrect results/treatment! Presumably, they are right most of the time.
This is why my surgeon says he prefers 'node sampling 'wher he takes all the first rank[dont really understand this]in my case 6 which he says includes sentinel.
Thanks for your replies ladies, sorry if I’ve worried anyone with this. If the SNB is 95% accurate as evie2007 says then I gues I’m just one of the 5%. Fingers crossed that the rest are clear I guess.
Percentages are only percentages. I read somewhere that around a third of women who have clear nodes go on to get a recurrance whilst a similar figure of women with affected nodes don’t. So it is all a bit random and realy not worth worrying about - worrying never improves the outcome whether the surgeon can explain what has happened or not. It’s natural for us to try to understand but 16 months down the line from diagnosis i realise that bc is all about surprises and contradictions and is prone to change at each visit to te hospital.