The pathologic stage of breast cancer can be assessed based on tumor size and axillary lymph node status. A total of stage 0, stage I, stage II, stage III, and stage IV are assigned. The higher the grade, the more advanced the tumor stage. Stage III breast cancer is basically a middle to late stage, indicating that the tumor is relatively large and or accompanied by axillary lymph node metastasis, but no distant metastasis is found, or stage IV if there are distant metastases such as bone and lung.
The treatment of breast cancer is a multidisciplinary, individualized and comprehensive treatment based on surgical treatment. Patients with stage III breast cancer without signs of distant metastases and in a general state that can tolerate surgery should undergo aggressive surgical treatment, which consists of surgery of the primary tumor and staged surgery of the axillary lymph nodes.
The management of the primary site includes an extended tumor resection (breast-conserving surgery) or mastectomy; the management of the axillary lymph nodes includes an anterior lymph node biopsy or axillary lymph node dissection. The current general trend in surgical management of breast cancer is to minimize trauma and improve quality of life while ensuring efficacy, with breast-conserving surgery and sentinel lymph node biopsy being the preferred surgical approach. After surgery, adjuvant chemotherapy, adjuvant endocrine therapy, adjuvant radiotherapy and adjuvant targeted therapy are possible according to the pathological and immunohistochemical indexes. Neoadjuvant chemotherapy can also be administered preoperatively.