Breast reconstruction after breast cancer surgery - persistent pain and quality of life 1-8 years after breast reconstruction.

Objectives: To assess the long-term outcome of breast reconstructions with special focus on chronic postsurgical pain (CPSP) in a larger cohort of breast cancer survivors.

Methods: A cross-sectional study on 121 women with mastectomy and breast reconstruction after mean 2 years 4 months follow up. The mean time from breast reconstruction to the follow-up visit was 4 years 2 months. We studied surveys on pain (Brief Pain Inventory, BPI and Douleur Neuropathique 4, DN4), quality of life (RAND-36 health survey), sleep (insomnia severity questionnaire, ISI), mood (Beck's Depression Index, BDI; Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale, HADS), and a detailed clinical sensory status. Patients were divided into three groups: abdominal flap (Deep inferior epigastric perforator flap, DIEP; Free transverse rectus abdominis flap, fTRAM, and Pedicled transverse rectus abdominis flap, pTRAM), dorsal flap (Latissimus dorsi flap, LD and Thoracodorsal artery perforator flap, TDAP), and other (Transverse myocutaneous gracilis flap, TMG; implant). Clinically meaningful pain was defined ≥ 4/10 on a numeric rating scale (NRS). We used patients' pain drawings to localize the pain. We assessed preoperative pain NRS from previous data.

Results: 106 (87.6%) of the patients did not have clinically meaningful persistent pain. We found no statistically significant difference between different reconstruction types with regards to persistent pain (=0.40), mood (BDI-II, =0.41 and HADS A, =0.54) or sleep (=0.14), respectively. Preoperative pain prior to breast reconstruction surgery correlated strongly with moderate or severe CPSP.

Conclusions: Moderate to severe CPSP intensity was present in 14% of patients. We found no significant difference in the prevalence of pain across different reconstruction types. Preoperative pain associated significantly with postoperative persistent pain.