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. 2014 Jul 1;10(3):161-165.
doi: 10.5152/tjbh.2014.2197. eCollection 2014 Jul.

Breast Carcinosarcomas

Savaş Yakan  1 , Erdem Sarı  1 , Nazif Erkan  1 , Mehmet Yıldırım  1 , Enver Vardar  2 , Ali Coşkun  1 , Durmuş Ali Çetin  1 , Nükhet Eliyatkın  2
Affiliations

Breast Carcinosarcomas

Savaş Yakan et al. J Breast Health. .

Abstract

Objective: Carcinosarcomas of the breast are rare and aggressive breast tumors. The optimal treatment strategies and the classification of these difficult to diagnose tumors are not clear in the literature due to their very low incidence. In this study, we aimed to evaluate patients who were operated on for breast carcinosarcoma and discuss the current literature.

Materials and methods: Ten patients who were treated with a diagnosis of breast carcinosarcoma between January 2000 - March 2013 at the Izmir Bozyaka Teaching and Training Hospital General Surgery Clinics were retrospectively analyzed.

Results: The mean age of the patients was 59.7 (±13.4) years. Eight patients underwent modified radical mastectomy, one patient lumpectomy and one patient breast conserving surgery + sentinel lymph node biopsy procedures. The TNM stage of patients were identified as stage 1 in 2 patients, stage 2 in 6 patients, and stage 3 in 2 patients. 60-month disease-free survival rate was 52.5% (±18.6). The overall survival rate was 53.3% (±20.5). Four patients died during follow-up.

Conclusion: It is reported that the prognosis of carcinosarcomas are as poor as triple negative epithelial tumors. In contrast to the literature, in our study the disease-free and overall survival rates according to stage were not different from epithelial tumors. In this regard, prospective studies including more patients are required.

Keywords: Breast; carcinosarcoma; metaplasia.

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Conflict of interest statement

Conflict of Interest: No conflict of interest was declared by the authors.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Mammographic view of the patient with pathologic T3 tumor (carcinosarcoma)
Figure 2. a–c
Figure 2. a–c
Small ducts and prominent lymphocyte in its periphery at the left upper field and tumor cells showing nodular pattern and layering containing lymphocytes at the other fields. (HE-x100) (a). On the left normal small ducts and adjacent cytokeratin positive tumor cells. (Pancytokeratin-x100) (b). Diffuse vimentin positivity in tumor cells within the fields with pancytokreatin positivity (Vimentin-x100) (c)
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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