Breast cancer in Zaria, Nigeria

A retrospective analysis of the clinical records of 129 women with breast cancer seen at the Ahmadu Bello University Teaching Hospital, Zaria has been carried out. The patients were young (median age 38 years), 64% were premenopausal and 89% were parous and had practised prolonged breastfeeding. Patients typically presented with massive breast tumour (median diameter 10 cm) with matted axillary lymph nodes in 57%. Eighty-eight per cent of patients had stage III or IV disease, and in 85% the histological tumour type was infiltrating ductal carcinoma. Mastectomy was the main mode of treatment and the default rate both before and after treatment was high. The median crude survival period for our patients was only 1.5 years. The survival disadvantage is probably the result of the combined effect of delayed presentation by the patients, the preponderance of biologically very aggressive tumours and our grossly limited therapeutic modalities.