The Outpatient Breast Clinic: Aiming at Best Practice

This full-colour, richly-illustrated book is an excellent source of rapidly retrievable information on aspects of relevance in daily clinical practice in the outpatient breast clinic. Expert guidance is provided on a full range of topics, including pitfalls of clinical examination, imaging and related tissue diagnosis, approaches to management decision-making in different disorders, the role of surgery and adjuvant therapy, follow-up and rehabilitation. In outpatient breast clinics, effective communication with patients must be established in order to address symptoms that in most cases are not serious but can be very worrying and sometimes lead to misdiagnosis and also to litigation. Outpatient consultations also offer an opportunity to encourage a healthy lifestyle and to provide information on matters such as risk assessment, screening and the most reliable websites. A well-functioning outpatient clinic is essential to a breast unit's overall proficiency. Readers will find this book an invaluable aid to good practice. The authors place particular emphasis on quality indicators and key priorities for implementation of the main guidelines, at the same time specifying the level of evidence for them and degree of recommendation. Practical measures for achieving the best results are highlighted, and helpful advice is provided on optimizing patient communication and reducing the psychological burden.