Breast abnormalities in patients with cystic fibrosis: previously unrecognized changes

We reviewed breast tissue from 19 female postpubertal and three prepubertal patients with cystic fibrosis to determine the histopathologic changes present. Autopsy material was available from 19 patients who died from complications of cystic fibrosis. Two patients had lumpectomies for breast carcinoma and an additional patient had a breast biopsy and bilateral prophylactic mastectomies for breast carcinoma. The postpubertal patients ranged in age from 18 to 50 years (median age, 32 years). The histologic changes in the breast of female patients with cystic fibrosis have not been fully studied, and the only case reported suggests that these patients suffered from complete lobular agenesis. This study shows that postpubertal breasts had normal development and varying degrees of fibrosis affecting lobular units and ducts, and that proliferative lesions and carcinoma could be encountered.