Women who have surgery for breast cancer often have to undergo radiation therapy.

It often causes breast deformities that then need to be corrected through reconstructive surgery.

Now researchers at the McGown Institute for Regenerative Medicine at the University of Pittsburgh and bioengineers at Carnegie Mellon University may have found a way to avoid that complication from breast cancer surgery.

They have developed a polymer based therapy that serves as artificial tissue filler after surgery and also delivers chemotherapy.

Dr Howard Edington, UPMC oncology surgeon and faculty member at McGown said: "We sought to develop a possible alternative to radiation therapy that would not only release chemotherapy slowly to kill the cancerous cells left behind after surgery, but that also would fill in the dimples and sometimes quite significant indentations that are common after breast surgery and radiation."

A gel made from a breast cancer chemotherapy drug was applied to mice with breast cancer tumors. Researchers found tumors all disappeared.

More laboratory testing must be done before clinical trials on women can begin, but researchers are hopeful this could soon be an alternative to breast radiation after surgery.