ABSTRACT
Introduction:
Breast cancer is the second leading cause of cancer death among women worldwide, and epidemiological studies may help understanding its mechanisms.
Objective:
To carry out a survey of the number of breast cancer cases diagnosed in a period of six years.
Methods:
The profile of breast cancers diagnosed in a tertiary hospital in Curitiba was compared with the literature, using a retrospective analysis of ductal/special types and lobular breast carcinoma reports issued between 2008 and 2013.
Results:
Three hundred twenty-seven (91.6%) cases of ductal/special types carcinoma and 30 (8.4%) cases of lobular carcinoma were diagnosed, totaling 357 samples. From these cases, 27 (7.5%) were carcinoma in situ (20 ductal and seven lobular) and 330 (92.4%) were invasive carcinoma (307 invasive ductal/special types and 23 lobular). The prevalence of breast cancer among women was 991% and the majority of patients were older than 50 years of age (67.2%). Regarding the União Internacional de Controle do Câncer/American Joint Committee on Cancer (UICC/AJCC) staging, 49.2% of the ductal/special types tumors were diagnosed in Stages I or II, while 56.6% of lobular carcinomas were diagnosed in Stages II or III/IV. Regarding the Nottingham score, most cases were intermediate grade (43.9%). A total of 61% of the tumors were estrogen receptor positive (ER+) and 54% were progesterone receptor positive (PR+). Moreover, 36.1% presented positive human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 (HER2+), a rate higher than that indicated by the literature.
Conclusion:
The breast carcinomas evaluated in this study presented a profile similar to that reported in the literature, with some peculiarities inherent to the local pathology service. Nevertheless, the low frequency of in situ cases indicates failure in early diagnosis.
Key words:
ductal carcinoma of the breast; lobular carcinoma; pathology; epidemiology; oncology
