text_1: Breast-cancer study questions lymph node removal
text_2: Room for improvement:  Readers would have benefited from early clarity that all participants in the study still had a sentinel lymph node biopsy and that the research focused on whether removal of all lymph nodes was necessary if the sentinel nodes were cancerous. There was no discussion of cost impact of the findings, or about whether insurance might curtail coverage of lymph node dissection. There was no discussion of the researchers’ admission of what could be potentially important limitations in the research. The story didn’t explain how often complications of lymph node dissection occur. Women who have an axillary lymph node dissection (ALND) following a diagnosis of breast cancer, sometimes develop infections at the surgery site or lymphedema. Depending on its severity, lymphedema can be painful, disfiguring, and expensive to treat. While the symptoms of lymphedema can be treated, especially if caught early, once a person develops lymphedema, the person is always at risk for a recurrence of the lymphedema. If ALND confers no mortality or disease-free survival benefit, it may no longer be recommended as standard treatment for women with T1 or T2 breast cancer with positive nodes as determined by sentinel lymph node dissection.