A multicenter cohort study to compare quality of life in breast cancer patients according to sentinel lymph node biopsy or axillary lymph node dissection.

Background: This prospective multicenter study assessed and compared the impact of different surgical procedures on quality of life (QoL) in breast cancer patients. Patients and methods: The EORTC QLQ-C30 and the EORTC QLQ-BR-23 questionnaires were used to assess global health status (GHS), arm (BRAS) and breast (BRBS) symptom scales, before surgery, just after surgery and 6 and 12 months later. The Kruskal–Wallis test with the Bonferroni correction was used to compare scores. A mixed model analysis of variance for repeated measurements was then applied to assess the longitudinal effect of surgical modalities on QoL. Results: Before surgery, GHS (P = 0.7807) and BRAS (P = 0.7688) QoL scores…