Clinical aspects of intraoperative radiotherapy in early breast cancer: short-term complications after IORT in women treated with low energy x-rays

Background: To assess postoperative complications, clinical outcome and histological findings in patients undergoing intraoperative radiotherapy with low energy x-rays for early breast cancer. Methods: We retrospectively analysed data of 208 women who underwent intraoperative irradiation during breast conserving surgery (BCS) between 2002 and 2007. Demographic, clinical and surgical parameters as well as short-term complications within the first postoperative week and histological findings were evaluated. Toxicities were assessed using the CTC/EORTC Score. Results: Postoperative complications were rare and the immediate toxicity low, without any grade 3/4 acute toxicity. The most frequent postoperative side effects were suggillation (24%) and palpable seroma (17.3%). In 78.6% of the axillary seroma and in 25% of the breast seroma a needle aspiration was inevitable. Erythema grade I-II of the breast was found in 27 women (13%); whereas in 7 patients (3.4%), mastitis was confirmed. In 57.7% of the cases, the pathological assessment revealed ductal invasive breast cancer and tumour size ranged between 0.1 and 4.5 cm (mean = 1.6 cm). Conclusion: IORT using Intrabeam (R) during BCS is safe, although it is associated with postoperative adverse events such as seroma. These should be mentioned and explained to women in detail during the preoperative discussion. This explicitly clinical description is useful for daily clinical practice; especially for giving a detailed analysis of the postoperative side effects during preoperative counselling.