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Two local surgeons are now offering a new approach to breast cancer treatment they say helps women feel less anxious preparing for surgery and more confident after it.

Doctors Anureet Bajaj, a University of Cincinnati Physicians plastic surgeon, and Jennifer Manders, a UC Physicians breast cancer surgeon, began offering in August what they call oncoplastic surgery.

It is a procedure in which a cancer and plastic surgeon work side by side to assess treatment options, remove the cancerous tumor and surrounding tissue and immediately reconstruct the disfigured breast using the patient's own tissue.

Manders said many breast cancer patients will have one surgery combining tumor removal and reconstruction, but their clinic at University Pointe in West Chester Twp. offers patients an appointment with both doctors at the same time to perform a unique, reconstruction option.

The approach is convenient and its less stressful for patients, she said.

"It minimizes the back-and-forth effort the patient has to have and it facilitates communication between me and my colleague, and we can come up with the best plan for our patient," she said.

"It's very anxiety-provoking to go from one doctor to another and you still have a lot of questions left."

Typically, when women are given the diagnosis of breast cancer, depending on the type of surgical treatment they choose, they're not always given the option of reconstruction, Bajaj said.

Cosmetic surgery is more common with mastectomies — in which the entire breast is removed — than in lumpectomies, which remove just the cancerous tissue. But both can be disfiguring.

"If a woman has a lumpectomy more in the middle of the chest and she has a relatively small breast, it's going to be a noticeable defect," Bajaj said.

With that in mind, patients basically have three options, she said: no reconstruction at all, reconstruction using a patient's own tissue or reconstruction with an implant.

Bajaj and Manders offer two procedures using a patient's own tissue.

One option is to use skin or soft tissue from a woman's stomach and reattach blood vessels under a microscope. This method is called free flaps.

The second option is uses a patient's own breast tissue by rearranging it and giving the breasts a "lift," Manders said. This method is called volume replacement.

The success of the procedure can sometimes depend on the size of the tumor compared to the size of a woman's breast, Manders said.

"If they have a large tumor and relatively small breasts, you won't be able to offer them oncoplastic surgery," she said.

Kathy Scott, 55, of Springfield, has been seeing Manders and Bajaj since last year. She said the opportunity to see them both at the same time is invaluable.

"Living in Springfield and driving down to either West Chester or Cincinnati, having one appointment just makes it so much better," she said. "And sometimes I will have an issue that I need to discuss that one doctor is better equipped to answer."

Scott had a free flap surgery last November after undergoing multiple lumpectomies in the past. She said she is very happy with the results and has had no complications.

"It's amazing. I think about how she actually cut the blood supply and everything free from my stomach and then she moved it into the breast area and reconnected it. It's just incredible," she said.

Contact this reporter at (513) 755-5127 or cfullam@coxohio.com.