Derrick J Beech, MD, FACS

Everyone deserves great care - everyone, everywhere

A breast cancer diagnosis can make it feel like your life has been turned upside down overnight. Within days, many women find themselves facing difficult questions: Do I need a mastectomy? Can I keep my breast? What happens to my lymph nodes? Should I consider reconstruction? What surprises many patients is how much breast cancer surgery has changed. A generation ago, treatment often meant removing the entire breast and many lymph nodes under the arm. Today, surgery is far more personalized....

Most breast cancer isn't inherited. But for a meaningful minority of patients, a single inherited gene mutation dramatically raises the risk, and knowing about it in advance can change the entire course of someone's life. As a surgical oncologist, some of the most powerful conversations I have are with patients learning, often for the first time, that their family history is a message worth decoding. What Is BRCA1 and BRCA2? BRCA1 and BRCA2 are genes that normally help repair damaged DNA and...