J Breast Cancer.  2010 Jun;13(2):174-179. 10.4048/jbc.2010.13.2.174.

Characteristics of Invasive Micropapillary Carcinoma of the Breast: In Comparison with Invasive Ductal Carcinoma

• Kim SH
• Hur SM
• Lee SK
• Kim WW
• Kim S
• Choe JH
• Kim JH
• Kim JS
• Nam SJ
• Yang JH
• Lee JE

• KMID: 2286543
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.4048/jbc.2010.13.2.174

Abstract

PURPOSE
Invasive micropapillary carcinoma (IMPC) of the breast is a rare and associated with high incidence of lymph node metastasis and poor outcome. The aims of this study were to provide a comprehensive analysis of clinicopathologic and immunohistochemical characteristics of IMPC and to elucidate the differences between IMPC and invasive ductal carcinoma (IDC).
METHODS
Sixty-one patients of IMPC were identified by retrospective review of database from January 2004 to December 2008. 221 patients were randomly selected among the IDC patients who received operation during the same period. Two groups were compared with uni- and multivariate analysis.
RESULTS
We observed significant differences in mean number of metastatic lymph nodes (6.1 vs. 1.9, p=0.001), positivity of lymph node (70.5% vs. 45.2%, p<0.001), and presence of lymphatic vessel invasion (75.4% vs. 34.8%, p<0.001) between IMPC and IDC patients. Although it has been known that triple negative breast cancer (TNBC) have lymphotropic tendency in their early T stage, 11.8% (26/221) of IDC and 3.3% (2/61) of IMPC patients were TNBC in this study (p=0.050). In multivariate analysis, IMPC histology showed no correlation with disease-free survival (DFS) and the lymphatic vessel invasion was a significant predictor of DFS.
CONCLUSION
The results of this study confirm that IMPC is unique subtype of breast cancer that is commonly accompanied by axillary lymph node metastasis and shows poor outcome, although it rarely presents the pattern of TNBC. Lymphatic vessel invasion rather than histology of IMPC seems to be more closely related to DFS.

Keyword

Breast; Carcinoma; Lymphatic metastasis; Prognosis

MeSH Terms

Breast
Breast Neoplasms
Carcinoma, Ductal
Disease-Free Survival
Glycosaminoglycans
Humans
Incidence
Lymph Nodes
Lymphatic Metastasis
Lymphatic Vessels
Multivariate Analysis
Neoplasm Metastasis
Prognosis
Retrospective Studies
Glycosaminoglycans

Figure

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  Figure 1 Invasive micropapillary carcinoma of the breast. Photomicrograph reveals carcinoma composed of small clusters of tumor cells within the clear stromal spaces (H&E stain, ×100).

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