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Invasive Breast Cancers

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Breast Cancer Essentials

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Abstract

Morphological classification is still the gold standard in the classification of breast tumours and includes a lot of histological entities with rare subtypes. The most common breast tumours are of epithelial origin. However, mesenchymal tumours, hematologic malignancies and solid tumour metastases occur less frequently. Although most breast cancer cases are invasive ductal carcinomas (NST), it should be kept in mind that there are less frequent subtypes such as invasive lobular carcinoma with different carcinogenesis steps or more aggressive subtypes such as invasive micropapillary carcinoma.

In this chapter, besides the most common breast tumour types, microscopic and macroscopic features of some special subtypes are also discussed.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Ege University, Faculty of Medicine, Department of Pathology, Izmir, Turkey

    Necmettin Ozdemir, Osman Zekioglu & Gurdeniz Serin

Authors
  1. Necmettin Ozdemir
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  2. Osman Zekioglu
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  3. Gurdeniz Serin
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Correspondence to Necmettin Ozdemir .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. European Academia of Senology, Düsseldorf, Germany

    Mahdi Rezai

  2. Dokuz Eylül University, Izmir, Turkey

    Mehmet Ali Kocdor

  3. University of Kocaeli, Ä°zmit/Kocaeli, Turkey

    Nuh Zafer Canturk

Tips and Tricks

Tips and Tricks

  • Approximately 60–70% of breast cancers are invasive ductal carcinoma (invasive carcinoma of no special type), and the second most common is invasive lobular carcinoma (8–10%).

  • The modified Bloom-Richardson grading system in which tubule formation, nuclear features of tumour cells and mitotic activity are evaluated is used to determine the degree of differentiation of breast cancers (see Table 5.1).

  • Tumours with a low modified Bloom-Richardson score have better prognosis.

  • Survival expectations are higher in low-grade tumours such as invasive cribriform carcinoma, tubular carcinoma, tubulolobular carcinoma and mucinous carcinoma.

  • The prognosis is worse in aggressive subtypes such as invasive micropapillary carcinoma and glycogen-rich breast carcinoma.

  • Breast cancers are grouped mainly according to their molecular expression status as luminal A, luminal B, HER-2 positive and basal-like (triple negative).

  • The molecular classification of breast cancers plays an important role in the selection of treatment protocols.

  • HER-2 overexpression is observed in approximately 20% of all breast cancers.

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Ozdemir, N., Zekioglu, O., Serin, G. (2021). Invasive Breast Cancers. In: Rezai, M., Kocdor, M.A., Canturk, N.Z. (eds) Breast Cancer Essentials. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-73147-2_5

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-73147-2_5

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