There are 481,000 women living in small south Texas towns surrounding Bexar and Travis County. Of these women, 598 will statistically be diagnosed with breast cancer this year. Currently, 7.42% of these women do not receive the same life-saving lumpectomy, mastectomy, and breast lesion removal surgeries that their counterparts in Bexar County do, and the remaining often receive sub-par or unspecialized care.
To further heighten the risk for these women, there are only 10 surgeons in this South Texas area specializing predominantly in breast cancer surgery, none of whom practice outside of Bexar or Travis County. Only four of these breast surgeons are women, and none of these surgeons speak Spanish; yet 13 at-risk counties surrounding Bexar and Travis County have Hispanic populations greater than 50%.
South Texas Breast Surgery was created to fill the dire need to serve and treat women living with breast cancer in and around Bexar County. Maria A. Palafox, MD is a tenured, experienced breast cancer surgeon with the passion and skill to serve these daughters, sisters, mothers, and grandmothers who are otherwise missing out entirely on critical specialized cancer care. She most recently served as the Chief of Breast and General Surgery for a hospital within the Tenet Healthcare network.
Dr. Palafox graduated from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in Cambridge and went on to pursue both her medical degree and a post-residency fellowship in critical care. She is a highly skilled professional trained in the most advanced laparoscopic and endoscopic techniques, has extensive breast surgery experience, and is adroit with the latest advances in genetic testing. She served as the liaison for the Committee on Cancer to the American College of Surgeons for Baptist Hospitals of Southeast Texas, an NAPBC-certified organization and Bayshore Medical Center in Pasadena, Texas.
Dr. Palafox is a native Spanish speaker and lives with her family in one of the at-risk counties. The practice specializes in diagnostic biopsy, genetic testing, and the surgical removal of breast cancer tumors. She has offices in south San Antonio (Brooks City Base) and in Pleasanton, Texas.