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Review
. 2020 May 11:9:343.
doi: 10.12688/f1000research.23469.1. eCollection 2020.

Case Report: Metastatic breast cancer to the gallbladder

Giulia Missori  1 , Francesco Serra  1 , Giorgia Prestigiacomo  1 , Andrea Aurelio Ricciardolo  1 , Lucio Brugioni  2 , Roberta Gelmini  1
Affiliations
Review

Case Report: Metastatic breast cancer to the gallbladder

Giulia Missori et al. F1000Res. .

Abstract

Cholecystitis is one of the leading causes of emergency surgical interventions; the occurrence of metastases to the gallbladder is rare and has only been reported in the literature exceptionally. Metastatic breast cancer to the gallbladder is even less frequent; in fact, breast cancer usually metastasizes to bone, lung, lymph nodes, liver and brain. We report the case of an 83-year-old female patient with a previous history of breast surgery with axillary dissection in 1997, followed by adjuvant chemotherapy due to invasive ductal carcinoma of the left breast. The patient was admitted at the emergency department for sepsis and an episode of acute kidney failure, anuria and fever. Right-upper quadrant abdominal pain triggered by food intake and abdominal tenderness was also present, placing the diagnostic suspicion of biliary sepsis due to acute cholecystitis. The histological examination of the surgical specimen highlighted the presence of metastasis from an infiltrating ductal breast carcinoma with positive hormone receptors. We also report here the results of a review of the literature looking at articles describing cases of gallbladder metastasis from breast cancer.

Keywords: Breast cancer; Cholecystitis; Emergency surgery.

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Conflict of interest statement

No competing interests were disclosed.

Figures

Figure 1.
Figure 1.. CT-scan showing a diffuse thickening of the gallbladder and inflammatory pericholecystic fluid.
Figure 2.
Figure 2.. Flow diagram of articles included in the literature review.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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