Suzuki I, Chakkabat P, Goicochea L, Campassi C, Chumsri S. Lymphoepithelioma-like carcinoma of the breast presenting as breast abscess. World J Clin Oncol 2014; 5(5): 1107-1112 [PMID: 25493247 DOI: 10.5306/wjco.v5.i5.1107]
Corresponding Author of This Article
Saranya Chumsri, MD, Department of Medicine, University of Maryland Marlene and Stewart Greenebaum Cancer Center, 22 S. Greene Street, Room S9D15B, Baltimore, MD 21201, United States. schumsri@umm.edu
Research Domain of This Article
Oncology
Article-Type of This Article
Case Report
Open-Access Policy of This Article
This article is an open-access article which was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Ikumi Suzuki, Saranya Chumsri, Department of Medicine, University of Maryland School of Medicine and the Marlene and Stewart Greenebaum Cancer Center, Baltimore, MD 21201, United States
Pimchandr Chakkabat, Department of Medicine, Chulalongkorn University, Bangkok 10330, Thailand
Lindsay Goicochea, Department of Pathology, University of Maryland School of Medicine and the Marlene and Stewart Greenebaum Cancer Center, Baltimore, MD 21201, United States
Cristina Campassi, Department of Diagnostic Radiology and Nuclear Medicine, University of Maryland School of Medicine and the Marlene and Stewart Greenebaum Cancer Center, Baltimore, MD 21201, United States
Author contributions: All the authors contributed to this work.
Correspondence to: Saranya Chumsri, MD, Department of Medicine, University of Maryland Marlene and Stewart Greenebaum Cancer Center, 22 S. Greene Street, Room S9D15B, Baltimore, MD 21201, United States. schumsri@umm.edu
Telephone: +1-410-3286373 Fax: +1-410-3286896
Received: March 21, 2014 Revised: September 2, 2014 Accepted: October 31, 2014 Published online: December 10, 2014
Abstract
Lymphoepithelioma-like carcinoma (LELC) is a rare type of neoplasm in which only twenty cases have been reported in the breast. This type of tumor can be difficult to distinguish from other breast tumors particularly medullary carcinoma and lymphoma in the breast. We present a case of LELC of the breast presenting as an abscess along with a review of the literature. This is the 21st reported case of LELC of the breast and the first case to present as an abscess. Her clinical picture could have been mistaken for other infectious or inflammatory diseases. Given the potential for favorable outcome, early detection and general knowledge of this neoplasm are essential to expedite treatment for this rare tumor type.
Core tip: We present a case of lymphoepithelioma-like carcinoma (LELC) of the breast, which is a rare tumor type that can be difficult to diagnose. This particular case is the first case of LELC of the breast presenting as an abscess with radiologic and histologic studies as well as literature review of this rare tumor.
