Breast cancer specialists at St. Vincent's Medical Center are providing a procedure that helps regain feeling and preserve nerves in the breast that may be damaged during a mastectomy.

Dr Valerie Brutus Lucenti, St. Vincent Medical Center's director of plastic surgery, and her partner, Dr. Stirling Craig, thought Tammy Nuccio, a breast cancer patient, was the perfect candidate.

Nuccio opted to have the surgery, making her the first patient in the state to undergo the procedure.

"Sensation started to come back slowly. It started to come back in different places, like higher up and moving around, and then weird places and again it's back to how do we train those nerves to do what they should do naturally," said Nuccio.

Nuccio says the procedure brought a form of normalcy back.

"It's something that helps you start taking those steps forward back to reclaiming your life before you heard the word cancer," said Nuccio.

Nuccio has three daughters, the oldest is 30.

She will be eligible to get mammograms early because of Nuccio's cancer history.

"I am strongly encouraging her to do it," said Nuccio.