ABSTRACT
Previous studies of patients with infiltrating ductal breast cancer treated with limited excision and radiotherapy have indicated that the presence of an extensive intraductal component (EIC) in the excision specimen is highly associated with subsequent breast recurrence. The presence or absence of an EIC in the primary tumors of 214 women who underwent mastectomy was related to the likelihood of finding additional foci of cancer in their mastectomy specimens using a correlated pathologic-radiologic mapping technique. Patients with primary tumors that were EIC-positive were significantly more likely to have carcinoma in the remainder of the breast than those with tumours that were EIC-negative. This difference was primarily due to the presence of residual intraductal carcinoma. In particular, 44% of EIC-positive patients had ‘prominent’ residual intraductal carcinoma compared with only 3% of EIC-negative patients, (p 0.00001). It was concluded that patients whose tumors contain an EIC more frequently have a large subclinical tumor burden in the remainder of the breast compared with patients whose tumors do not contain an EIC.
