Practice patterns regarding drains management in breast surgery: Results of a survey of Senonetwork Italia breast centers

In this national survey, we report a large variability regarding drain use in the breast conservative setting. After mastectomy or axillary node dissection, drains are usually employed and generally removed when 24 hours output was <50cc. Consistent with litera‐ture data, their use has still an impact on the hospital length of stay. Surgeons generally continue antibiotic prophylaxis during the 24 perioperative hours and antibiotic use is still controversial regard‐ing both the timing of discontinuation and the type used, despite precise guidelines present in literature. Furthermore, according to our results, most surveyed surgeons believe drains play a clinically relevant role in breast surgery and that they will continue to have importance in the future.