Pathologic Types of Breast Cancer

According to the the latest (2003) WHO classification of tumors of the breast (wikipedia)

Invasive breast carcinomas

  • Invasive ductal carcinoma
    • Most are "not otherwise specified"
    • The remainder are given subtypes:
      • Mixed type carcinoma
      • Pleomorphic carcinoma
      • Carcinoma with osteoclastic giant cells
      • Carcinoma with choriocarcinomatous features
      • Carcinoma with melanotic features
  • Invasive lobular carcinoma
  • Tubular carcinoma
  • Invasive cribriform carcinoma
  • Medullary carcinoma
  • Mucinous carcinoma and other tumours with abundant mucin
    • Mucinous carcinoma
    • Cystadenocarcinoma and columnar cell mucinous carcinoma
    • Signet ring cell carcinoma
  • Neuroendocrine tumours
    • Solid neuroendocrine carcinoma (carcinoid of the breast)
    • Atypical carcinoid tumour
    • Small cell / oat cell carcinoma
    • Large cell neuroendocrine carcioma
  • Invasive papillary carcinoma
  • Invasive micropapillary carcinoma
  • Apocrine carcinoma
  • Metaplastic carcinomas
    • Pure epithelial metaplastic carciomas
      • Squamous cell carcinoma
      • Adenocarcinoma with spindle cell metaplasia
      • Adenosquamous carcinoma
      • Mucoepidermoid carcinoma
    • Mixed epithelial/mesenchymal metaplastic carcinomas
  • Lipid-rich carcinoma
  • Secretory carcinoma
  • Oncocytic carcinoma
  • Adenoid cystic carcinoma
  • Acinic cell carcinoma
  • Glycogen-rich clear cell carcinoma
  • Sebaceous carcinoma
  • Inflammatory carcinoma
  • Bilateral breast carcinoma

Precursor lesions

  • Lobular neoplasia
    • lobular carcinoma in situ
  • Intraductal proliferative lesions
    • Usual ductal hyperplasia
    • Flat epithelial hyperplasia
    • Atypical ductal hyperplasia
    • Ductal carcinoma in situ
  • Microinvasive carcinoma
  • Intraductal papillary neoplasms
    • Central papilloma
    • Peripheral papilloma
    • Atypical papilloma
    • Intraductal papillary carcinoma
    • Intracystic papillary carcinoma

Benign epithelial lesions

  • Adenosis, includin variants
    • Sclerosing adenosis
    • Apocrine adenosis
    • Blunt duct adenosis
    • Microglandular adenosis
    • Adenomyoepithelial adenosis
  • Radial scar / complex sclerosing lesion
  • Adenomas
    • Tubular adenoma
    • Lactating adenoma
    • Apocrine adenoma
    • Pleomorphic adenoma
    • Ductal adenoma

Myoepithelial lesions

  • Myoepitheliosis
  • Adenomyoepithelial adenosis
  • Adenomyoepithelioma
  • Malignant myoepithelioma

Mesenchymal tumors (including sarcoma)

  • Haemangioma
  • Angiomatosis
  • Haemangiopericytoma
  • Pseudoangiomatous stromal hyperplasia
  • Myofibroblastoma
  • Fibromatosis (agressive)
  • Inflammatory myofibroblastic tumour
  • Lipoma
    • Angiolipoma
  • Granular cell tumour
  • Neurofibroma
  • Schwannoma
  • Angiosarcoma
  • Liposarcoma
  • Rhabdomyosarcoma
  • Osteosarcoma
  • Leiomyoma
  • Leiomysarcoma

Fibroepithelial tumours

  • Fibroadenoma
  • Phyllodes tumour
    • Benign
    • Borderline
    • Malignant
  • Periductal stromal sarcoma, low grade
  • Mammary hamartoma

Tumours of the nipple

  • Nipple adenoma
  • Syringomatous adenoma
  • Paget's disease of the nipple

Malignant lymphoma

metastatic tumours

Tumours of the male breast

  • Gynecomastia
  • Carcinoma
    • In situ
    • Invasive