More than a feeling: A surgical resident chooses nerve repair to regain breast sensation after mastectomy

When Nicole Beck Clifford, DMD, MD, decided to have a mastectomy at 30 years old, she knew what she was looking for in terms of outcomes. 

First, she wanted to reduce her breast cancer risk. 

Second, she wanted a mastectomy with reconstruction, which is the surgical process of rebuilding breasts during surgery. 

And third, she wanted to restore as much sensory nerve function in her breasts as possible. To achieve that, Nicole underwent a procedure known as Resensation^® as part of her mastectomy and reconstruction.  

A year after her operation, she’s regained pain, touch, and temperature sensation across most of her breasts. She also is less anxious living without such a high breast cancer risk hanging over her head. 

“It’s a super personal decision. It was absolutely the right decision,” she says. 

Mastectomy to lower breast cancer risk — and anxiety

Nicole, an oral and maxillofacial surgical resident at Harvard and Massachusetts General Hospital, opted for mastectomy as a preventative procedure. After her mother’s initial breast cancer diagnosis, she underwent genetic counseling and found she was at a high risk.

In 2020, her mother’s cancer came back — she was diagnosed with metastatic cancer. That same year, Nicole’s cousin received the same diagnosis despite not having breast cancer before. Both would pass away from the disease.

In addition to confronting this profound heartbreak, Nicole also knew that one in three people who are diagnosed with early-stage breast cancer will have a recurrence that becomes metastatic breast cancer. She was worried about her future.

Undergoing a bilateral mastectomy, which means removing both breasts, made sense to her. She would drastically lower her chance of developing breast cancer, and it would also reduce anxiety that could come every time she underwent breast imaging to screen for cancer. Even though she was young, such imaging was recommended every six months for someone with her elevated cancer risk.

By 2023, she had decided to go forward with the procedure. She got married the same year. She knew her mastectomy choice was right in 2024 when she had her first mammogram. After the scan, she had to have a call-back mammogram, ultrasound follow-up MRI, and biopsy due to an abnormal finding. She ended up being fine, but the anxiety associated with that experience was overwhelming.

Her mastectomy surgery was already booked at the time of that first mammogram. Despite some concerns about having the surgery at such a young age, and the fact that she would not be able to breastfeed if she had children, she was confident in her choice. The concern and fear over something showing up on a mammogram “was not something I wanted to experience every six months for the rest of my life,” Nicole says.

Choosing Resensation as part of a reconstruction

Once she decided to have a mastectomy, Nicole knew she also wanted reconstruction. “It was super important to me as a 30-year-old female at the time,” she says. “I wanted to feel like a woman in my own skin. It wasn’t even a question.”

Another critical part of her choice for the operation: Resensation. The procedure uses donated, sterilized human nerve tissue (commonly known as a nerve graft) to reconnect nerves in the chest during breast reconstruction surgery. The graft acts as a bridge between two cut nerves, providing a pathway for them to regrow. This means that, over time, Nicole and other people undergoing Resensation surgery have the potential to feel sensation in their chest again.

This was key for Nicole because she didn’t want to feel permanent numbness across her chest. It was also important for sexual intimacy, she says. Patients who undergo Resensation may also have a lower risk of developing chronic nerve pain, which she wanted to reduce as much as possible.

“I felt confident going forward with this at such a young age because Resensation was an option,” she says.

Picking a surgical team across the country

Nicole primarily looked at two factors when selecting her surgeons: Who was most experienced in performing Resensation surgeries, and what were their patients' outcomes? She was also able to ask colleagues for recommendations.

That led her to the husband-and-wife team of Anne Peled, MD, a plastic and breast cancer surgeon, and Ziv Peled, MD, a nerve and plastic surgeon, based in San Francisco. Nicole saw that they performed these surgeries for hundreds of patients over the years. Anne Peled is also a breast cancer survivor and in 2025 also underwent the Resensation procedure.

“They had come highly recommended from colleagues and friends,” Nicole says.

As a surgeon herself, Nicole was able to ask questions about the specifics of how the surgery would be done.

Nicole also appreciated that the surgeons told her beforehand that they would try to preserve as much of her nerve as possible, but they wouldn’t do so if it meant reducing the success of the primary goal to reduce her breast cancer risk. That meant they would use nerve grafts if necessary, which ended up being the case for Nicole in both breasts.

The surgeons were also realistic about what Nicole could expect after the operation, and how long it could take for sensation to come back to her breasts. It wouldn’t be instantaneous, and she would need to practice sensory rehabilitation exercises to encourage the brain to re-learn connect sensory stimulation with sensory response. It helped Nicole anticipate what would come next and understand that she could experience positive changes over time.

Building back feeling, one year later

Nicole underwent her procedure in 2024. A year later, she’s happy with her progress. The most important result is that she has “peace of mind of how low my risk of breast cancer currently is.”

She is also continuing to improve after the surgery, and that improvement is growing over time. “I have pain sensation everywhere,” she says, which is not a bad thing. Pain sensation means that she can feel in different areas of her breasts. She is now experiencing light touch that is not pain, and she’s able to feel temperature in more areas of both breasts, which is part of the recovery process.

Her experience also led her to help others. Trying to understand her breast cancer risk and sort through options in terms of genetic counseling, screening, and surgery “felt overwhelming, even as someone who works in the medical system, day in and day out,” she says.

She also realized that many women and their families didn’t know the true risk of breast cancer, especially the risk of early-stage breast cancer coming back as metastatic disease.

This experience pushed Nicole and her family to found MBCure. They created the non-profit in honor of her mother, Jacquie Reynolds Beck, and cousin, Kerry O’Riordan McAdam. So far, they have raised $1.5 million and counting for metastatic breast cancer research. The group also works to increase education and awareness of metastatic breast cancer and provide funding to help people living with it.

“I’m very passionate about the work that our family continues to do to honor my mom and Kerry and help people understand their risk, and inform them in risk reduction strategies, or screenings appropriate for them so they can make informed decisions,” she says.

With more information, Nicole hopes others will know their options and feel more confident in their choices throughout their breast cancer journey.

Benefits of Resensation

In the centuries-long history of mastectomy operations, Resensation is a relatively new procedure. Removing cancer or cancer risk is the primary function of mastectomy, but trained surgeons now have options to reconstruct nerves, offering the potential of restoring sensory nerve function. That can be true for many patients who do or do not also have breast reconstruction. Anne Peled, MD, says it’s an option for almost anyone with the rare exception being someone who has had radiation in the past, which can affect nerves.

Anne Peled, MD, pioneered techniques with her husband, Ziv Peled, nearly a decade ago, to preserve as much nerve function as possible. She is also a cancer survivor and underwent the procedure herself during a mastectomy in 2025. When discussing your own surgical options and goals with your provider, it’s important to weigh your personal risks along with the potential benefits of each option.

Dr. Peled suggests consulting with an experienced Resensation surgeon, which you can find through the surgeon locator. Coverage for Resensation is not yet the standard of care for breast reconstruction, but many health insurance policies will cover it. Coverage will vary widely, so patients should work with a Resensation surgeon to obtain pre-authorization for the procedure.

Here’s why she recommends Resensation for just about any patient undergoing mastectomy:

Reduces the risk of chronic pain. Because nerves are cut during mastectomy, patients are at risk for nerve-related complications. That includes post-mastectomy pain syndrome (PMPS), which can feel like pain, tingling, numbness, or itching. “When you cut through the nerves and don’t reconstruct them, they can form neuromas that fire in weird ways, sending pain messages to the brain.” Peled says. Instead of leaving the nerves cut, grafting through Resensation can allow them to regrow over time, potentially restoring some of their function.

Prevents numbness. Numbness can also be a problem all its own, and it’s often not limited to just the breast area. Numbness can go from your shoulder to your belly button, she says. “If you’ve had dental work you know how it feels to have that numbness. Now imagine that for your entire torso but instead of wearing off in a few hours, it’s permanent.”

Preserves safety reflexes. Not being able to feel something good means not being able to feel something bad either. In that way, people can lose what’s called “protective sensation,” where your body will alert you of danger ahead. “People can have curling iron injuries, or burn through their skin with a heating blanket,” Peled says. She also knew a woman who had mastectomy before Resensation was an option, whose breasts had fallen out of her sports bra, and she didn’t know because she didn’t feel it. Resensation can restore your body’s protective instincts and warning signs.

Maintains quality of life. Overall, Resensation can help people who undergo the procedure continue on as much as possible as they did before surgery. Dr. Peled’s patients have told her that they want to make sure they can do things that many of us take for granted, like feel a child they’re hugging to their bodies, feel their chests during activities like rock climbing, and maintain sexual satisfaction, as chests and nipples can be an important aspect of erotic play. “All of these pieces are at play and a big deal,” says Peled.