Cytocaryometric characteristics of carcinomas of the human breast

By means of a graduated microscope eyepiece-micrometer, karyometric investigations were carried out on cytological smears from 21 patients with breast cancer (adenocarcinoma--7, scirrhous--5, medullar--3, intraductal--3, and undifferentiated--3). In breast cancer, the number of the cell groups was high; the karyometric histograms were multi-peaked, without well expressed peaks, shifted to the right and the nuclear sizes were large. The mean nuclear area and volume were the largest in undifferentiated carcinoma and adenocarcinoma, and they were the smallest in scirrhous carcinoma (the mean area) and in intraductal carcinoma (the mean volume).