radical mastectomy
3
6.1
- noun
- /ˈrædɪkəl mæˈstɛktəmi/
- Specialized
:
mastectomía radical
- "When she was ten or eleven, her mother got breast cancer and underwent two radical mastectomies.
- a modified radical mastectomy
- underwent a modified radical mastectomy
Examples
-
I learned she had breast cancer and underwent a radical mastectomy upon returning home from a 5th grade class trip to Philadelphia.
Blog text (32) -
Her past medical history revealed that she underwent a modified radical mastectomy for breast cancer 5 years ago.
Academic text (2007) -
A second radical mastectomy, all the chemo her body could take.
-
I have two daughters who are approaching their early teenage years and a mother who is a long-term survivor of breast cancer and had a radical mastectomy almost 24 years ago now.
Blog text (5) -
Mrs. XYZ is a 56-year-old postmenopausal lady who underwent left side modified radical mastectomy for breast carcinoma.
Academic text (2007) -
In 1980, my aunt chose to undergo a radical mastectomy after her breast cancer diagnosis.
-
The surgeon explained that a radical mastectomy would involve removing the breast and surrounding lymph nodes.
-
After her radical mastectomy, she began chemotherapy to ensure all cancer cells were eliminated.
How Invasive
- Specialized
3
6.1
- Specialized
12
4.0
- Specialized
1
8.6
- Specialized
4
5.4
- Specialized
9
4.9
Surface Forms
Morphology
The meaning is compositional: in medical use 'radical' conveys thorough/extensive, and 'mastectomy' is removal of the breast, so together they mean an extensive mastectomy removing underlying tissue and lymph nodes. This adjective+noun composition is regular and cross-linguistically paralleled (e.g. Spanish 'mastectomía radical'), so a learner who knows both constituents can infer the MWE's meaning.
Etymology
Radical mastectomy names a type of surgery where mastectomy means removal of the breast and radical means 'more than usual', because doctors also removed chest muscle and the lymph nodes in the armpit. That's why the name shows it was a larger operation done to stop the cancer from spreading.