Back For More Guidance

[Lin]

As some of you might remember, I first posted to this list on 12-30-2007
concerning the cancer diagnoses of my best friend Annette. She did
really well with the first surgery where her surgeon attempted to remove
the entire "suspicious" area. It turned out though he didn't get "clean
margins" and would have to do a second surgery. He agreed to her having
a breast MRI prior to the surgery and it showed more micro-calcifications
than the original mammogram. She had her 2nd surgery just 13 days after
the first. The surgeon had a pathologist in the operating room to analze
the tissue to help in determining if he would have to remove the entire
breast. He first did a sentinel biopsy of her lymph node which was cancer
free then he remove another milk duct which was also cancer free. He then decided to remove an area adjacent to the milk duct which was "fatty tissue" and couldn't be frozen so they had to send it out for testing. Now to the problem. When she called the surgeon for the pathology report she was told everything looked good but the surgeon did want to talk with her at her next appt in a week. In the mean time we went to her oncologist who kept talking about more surgery or complete removal of the breast and when we questioned this he said it was because she didn't get "clean margins". We then went to the surgeon who said the "fatty tissue" he sent out for testing did come back with cancer but he was sure it was from the clean side and that he "felt" she did have clean margins. The whole problem is that the surgeon didn't mark the tissue sample as to which side would have been the "clean" side and now they don't know if the cancer was on the side next to the duct or the other side making it "clean". My friend does not want to have any more surgery or chemo. She would prefer to have mammosite radiation but now fears that she won't be eligible because there's a question about the clean margins. Have any of you gone through something similiar or could provide some quidance as to what to do next ??
God bless you all and praying for a cure.

Lin (Pensacola, FL)