Thirty-year experience of surgery for breast carcinoma in men

Objective: To present the long-term outcome after surgery for breast carcin oma in men. Design: Retrospective study. Setting: University Hospital, Switzerland. Subjects: 37 consecutive men who were operated on for breast carcinoma betw een 1968 and 1998. Results: The mean age was 67 years (range 41-89). The delay between the fir st clinical presentation and operation ranged from 1 month to 3 years (medi an 3.5 months). Operations included modified radical mastectomy (n = 19), r adical mastectomy (n = 12), simple mastectomy(n = 3), Halsted procedure (n = 1), and conservative resection (n = 1). One patient had only a biopsy and was excluded from survival analysis. There were 30 infiltrating ductal car cinomas, 4 in situ ductal carcinomas, 2 papillary carcinomas, and 1 adenoid cystic carcinoma. Most tumors (n = 25, 68%) were in the subareolar region. The overall survival at 10 years was 44%, but it was significantly influen ced by the stage of disease, ranging from 57% in stage I (n = 12), to 26% i n stage II (n = 15), and 0 in stage III (n = 8). Conclusion: Although the long term survival in stage I and II is similar in men and women, the rarity of breast carcinoma in men and its location in t he subareolar region may delay diagnosis and treatment.