Abstract
Carcinoma of an accessory mammary gland is an extremely rare tumor. A 61-year-old male patient presented with a hard mass measuring 85 mm × 51 mm in the left axilla. Incisional biopsy histopathologically showed an adenocarcinoma compatible with breast carcinoma originating in an accessory mammary gland. Systemic examinations revealed no evidence of malignant or occult primary lesion in the bilateral mammary glands or in other organs. Neoadjuvant chemotherapy was performed for the locally advanced axillary tumor and reduced the tumor to 55 mm in size, and, then, he could undergo complete resection with a negative surgical margin in combination with reconstructive surgery to fill the resulting skin defect with a local flap of the latissimus dorsi muscle. The patient has presented with no metastatic lesion in four years since the operation. This unusual case shows that neoadjuvant chemotherapy is an effective and tolerated therapy for advanced accessory breast cancer in the axilla.
Highlights
Cases of adenocarcinoma in the axilla are uncommon and can be regarded as sebaceous or sweat gland cancer, mammary carcinoma arising in an accessory mammary gland, or metastatic lymph nodes from breast cancer or another primary cancer [1,2,3]
(b) Figure 2: (a) Computed tomography (CT) showed an exposed and lobulated 77 mm soft tissue density mass with faint calcification in wide contact with the skin, enlarged lymph nodes in the left axilla, and small round lymph nodes less than 10 mm in the mediastinum. (b) After the neoadjuvant chemotherapy, the tumor was reduced to 51 mm in diameter, while the small mediastinum lymph nodes remained about the same in size
Accessory breast cancer must be pathologically demonstrated to be located adjacent to normal breast ducts or lobules that are not connected with the proper mammary gland, and it is necessary to exclude the possibility of a metastatic lesion from another primary cancer [6]
Summary
Cases of adenocarcinoma in the axilla are uncommon and can be regarded as sebaceous or sweat gland cancer, mammary carcinoma arising in an accessory mammary gland, or metastatic lymph nodes from breast cancer or another primary cancer [1,2,3]. We describe a rare case of a male patient with an axillary malignant tumor which could be histopathologically compatible with breast cancer arising in an accessory mammary gland
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