Pleomorphic lobular carcinoma of the breast: a comparison of cytopathological features with other lobular carcinoma variants

Abstract

Based on our results, a cytological diagnosis of PLC should be proposed if there are moderate- to large-sized nuclei, prominent nucleoli, a moderate-to severe degree of nuclear pleomorphism, apocrine change and necrosis in the background in FNA biopsy samples.

Mixed pleomorphic lobular and apocrine carcinoma of the breast: A case report suggesting pathogenesis

“…3,10 The classic type of ILC is mostly ER-positive luminal subtype (95%), and triple-negative subtype is extremely rare (less than 1%), [11][12][13][14] whereas PLCs are frequently triple-negative (10-20%) and show apocrine differentiation (40%). 6,15,16 These data suggest a strong relationship between PLC and apocrine differentiation. Two hypotheses have been proposed for the oncogenesis of ILC.…”

“…Invasive lobular carcinoma is a special type of breast cancer that is characterized by discohesive features of tumor cells caused mainly by constitutive loss of E‐cadherin function . The classic type of ILC is mostly ER‐positive luminal subtype (95%), and triple‐negative subtype is extremely rare (less than 1%), whereas PLCs are frequently triple‐negative (10–20%) and show apocrine differentiation (40%) . These data suggest a strong relationship between PLC and apocrine differentiation.…”

A review of invasive lobular carcinoma of the breast: Should it be treated like invasive ductal carcinoma?

“…They most often belong to the luminal molecular subtype [5] with most not expressing HER2 nor basal epithelial markers. The pleomorphic variant of ILC however shows a relatively higher frequency of HER2 expression of up to 35 -80% and is more often ER-negative or triple negative [6], with only 10 -76% of pleomorphic ILC being ER-positive. Correspondingly, the proliferation index is typically higher and the tumour displays a more aggressive clinical course [7,8].…”

Invasive lobular carcinoma of the breast: the increasing importance of this special subtype

“…2) [3,15,47]. It has long been recognised, however, that an important subpopulation of cases do not conform to this ER/PR+, HER2− phenotype and as such are either ER/ PR negative, triple negative, or HER2+, with high grade and the pleomorphic ILC (PILC) subtype more likely than other morphological subtypes to exhibit such phenotypes [23,[47][48][49][50][51]. A recent study of Mexican breast cancer patients compared the disease-free survival and overall survival between ILC and IBC-NST.…”