[Louise O'Brien]

I have a friend who just had a double mastectomy on Tuesday. She was Stage One. More on that later. The surgeon and plastic surgeon worked together. As soon as the mastectomy was over, the ps moved in to insert implants. Her nipples were spared. The total operation only took 2 1/2 hours and she's thrilled. I talked to her today. She's in no pain and is just waiting for the drains to come out.

Reconstruction surgery has come a long way in the past few years. There are options available now that weren't even available to me three years ago when I went through reconstruction surgery.

She originally had a lumpectomy but because she had extremely dense breasts, they found another tiny tumour that didn't show up in any of her tests. And they found something in the other breast. BTW - she didn't have any discernible lumps - it was a pattern of calcifications.

She was still Stage One because everything was caught early and it hadn't spread but she opted for the double mastectomy on the advice of the oncologists she consulted. Basically they feared that because her breasts were so dense and because it was in both breasts, there would always be the concern that there might be something that they couldn't see. That treatment might not "get it all".

So stage or grade is not the only issue.