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| Apocrine Metaplasia | ||||||
| Etiology • Secondary to an irregular response by breast tissue to hormonal stimuli | ||||||
| Pathogenesis • May be due to relative or absolute excess of estrogen, decrease in progesterone, or abnormal response to either hormone by breast tissue, | ||||||
| Epidemiology • 60-90% of breasts at autopsy • Reproductive age women | ||||||
| General Gross Description • "Blue-dome" cysts which may be quite large • Firm gray-white fibrous tissue General Microscopic Description | • Cysts containing inspissated secretions which may calcify • Cysts may also contain macrophages; lined by flattened epithelium • Apocrine metaplasia with columnar epithelium containing small nuclei and brightly eosinophilic cytoplasm Clinical Correlation | • About 10% of women have clinically evident disease • May be associated with tenderness and irregular nodularity which varies during the menstrual cycle • Microcalcifications may be demonstrable on mammogram •May be associated with epithelial hyperplasia or sclerosing adenosis although those entities should be reported separately • Cysts and fibrosis do not elevate risk for breast carcinoma References | • Cotran RS, Kumar V, Robbins SL: Robbins Pathologic Basis of Disease. 5th edition. Philadelphia, W.B. Saunders, 1994, pp. 1093-4. Apocrine Metaplasia
| Synopsis by: Melinda Sanders M.D. (T04000M74320)[302]
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