When choosing the best medical team to treat your breast cancer, be sure to ask if your doctors have a breast cancer tumor board. If their answer is no, consider getting a second opinion.

What are tumor boards? They are groups composed of cancer specialists from all the disciplines involved in the diagnosis and treatment of a cancer patient. This includes surgical oncology, medical oncology, radiation oncology, radiology, genetics, pathology, plastic surgery, social work, nursing, and even patient advocacy.

Any facility designated and accredited as a cancer center by the National Cancer Institute is required to have a tumor board for each and every type of cancer they treat. This includes, of course, breast cancer.

Tumor boards typically meet weekly to discuss patients seen during the past week for evaluation. Any case that is more complex than average or that warrants a team review before treatment plans are initiated is reviewed by the tumor board.

For the patient, it's like getting a giant, free consultation. The pathology slides and all breast imaging and staging studies are reviewed by the team as a group. From this discussion, recommendations are made about the most appropriate care that the patient should be offered.

Often, open discussions revolve around the best treatment options for which the patient is a candidate, including clinical trials that the patient may be eligible for. After the conference, the physician who initially saw the patient contacts her to relate the outcome of the discussion.

These discussions are invaluable for some patients with complicated disease, controversial pathology results, or locally advanced disease, all of which require careful discussion of the wisest course of action to pursue.

So ask your team if they have a tumor board. Ask if yours was one of the cases discussed and what the outcome of the discussion was. If the doctor looks puzzled and says "tumor board?" - pack up your pathology slides and breast imaging studies and get a second opinion elsewhere.