Subareolar breast cancers

Despite the high rate of pathologic involvement of the nipple-areola complex (NAC) with subareolar cancers and the suboptimal cosmetic results when lumpectomy removes the NAC, breast conservation surgery has been extended to include these patients.

Ninety-five patients with subareolar cancers operated on between 1979 and 1998 were identified and the relationships between the pathologic findings, treatment, and outcome were studied.

Clinical involvement of the NAC (P = 0.001), clinical presentation (P <0.001, mammographic calcium or Paget's disease), and pathologic tumor size (P = 0.019) were significantly related to pathologic involvement of the NAC in univariate analysis. After consideration for clinical NAC involvement, no other variable was significantly related to pathologic NAC involvement in multivariate analysis. Thirty-three patients underwent mastectomy, and 62 were treated with breast conservation. Radiation therapy (P = 0.005), clinical (P = 0.031), and pathologic (P = 0.037) involvement of the NAC were significantly related to local disease-free survival in breast conservation patients in univariate analysis. After consideration for radiation therapy in multivariate analysis, clinical involvement of the NAC was the only additional variable significantly related to local recurrence in breast conservation patients. Clinical or pathologic involvement of the NAC was not significantly associated with local and distant recurrence after mastectomy. No other variable was significantly related to local outcome in univariate analysis in patients treated with mastectomy.

Subareolar cancers can be successfully treated with breast conservation surgery provided adjuvant radiation therapy is always given. Clinical involvement of the nipple-areola complex is associated with high risk of local failure when treated with breast conservation without radiation therapy.