Breast cancer metastatic to the submandibular gland. Case report

Metastatic disease in the major salivary glands is rare and the parotid gland is most frequently involved. Secondary deposits in the submandibular gland are very uncommon. We report a case of a 50-year-old woman who developed a metastasis from breast cancer in the right submandibular gland, 9 years after primary surgery for G3 T1c N0 ipsilateral breast carcinoma. The peculiarity of the case was the unusual site of the metastatic disease and the difficulty in differential diagnosis with primitive ductal salivary carcinoma.