Two Women & Infants Breast Surgeons Become 1st in RI to Use Hidden Scar Technique
Tuesday, October 18, 2016
Doctor Jennifer Gass, MD and Dr. David Edmonson, of The Breast Health Center at Women and Infants Hospital, have been certified in a new technique called Hidden Scar Breast Surgery. They are the first in Rhode Island and among the first in the region to achieve the certification.
“This is an approach to breast cancer surgery that attempts to hide the scar in areas not easily visible to the patient or others, such as the inframammary fold, the peri-areola margin or the axillary crease. This allows us to remove the cancer safely while reducing visible scarring,” said Jennifer Gass, MD, co-director of the Breast Health Center at Women & Infants and the hospital’s surgeon-in-chief.
Hidden Scar Breast Surgery
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“When a woman has surgery to remove breast cancer, we will do anything to help eliminate the daily reminder of the disease, including using this cosmetic procedure to hide the telling scars,” Dr. Edmonson says.
Every year, about 232,000 women are diagnosed with breast cancer that requires surgery. Patients who undergo Hidden Scar Breast Cancer Surgery experience optimal clinical and cosmetic outcomes and are at no higher risk of recurrence then patients who undergo an other surgical technique.
The technology augments the tools breast surgeons have available to them to improve the cosmetic outcome of breast cancer surgery.
Doctor's Gass and Edmonson are also trained in oncoplastic surgery, a novel surgical procedure that combines the best techniques in plastic surgery with oncologic surgery to remove breast cancer while preserving and reconstructing the breasts in the most natural looking way at the time the cancer is removed.
Others Pursuing Certification
Others pursuing certification are Candace Dyer, MD, of the Breast Health Center at Kent; Sonali Pandya, MD, and Ashley Stuckey, MD, who both see patients at Women & Infants and Kent; and Hannah Bansil, MD, of Women & Infants.
Related Slideshow: 2015 RI Hospital Safety Scores
Below are snapshota of the patient safety scores for nine Rhode Island hospitals, as compiled by Leapfrog.com, for 2015.
For more information -- and other category criteria -- go to the scorecard website here to find out more about each hospital's rankings.
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