ABSTRACT
Background and purpose:Surgical treatment of breast cancer traditionally has resected including the nipple-areola complex (NAC), because this area had a significant probability of containing occult tumors. The purpose of this study was to investigate the involvement of NAC in breast cancer and evaluate the feasibility of nipple-Areola complex-sparing mastectomy. Methods:168 cases of specimen of NAC collected from breast cancer with 5 mm subareola tissue preserved were sent to pathological examination in order to observe the tumor involvement of nipple, areola, subareola tissue respectively. Results:Tumor involved with nipple, areola and subareola tissue in 3 cases,areola and subareola tissue in 10 cases, and subareola tissue only in 13 cases.The tumors were all located superficially and centrally to the breast in all cases with nipple and areola involvement except sub areola tissue. The factors relative to the involvement of NAC included the location of the primary tumor, alteration of local skin of nipple- areola(?2=9.672,P=0.002), median tumor size(?2=7.141,P=0.008), positive axillary lymph node(?2=6.081,P=0.014) and clinical pathological stage(?2=10.142,P=0.006). Conclusion:If no clinical sign of NAC is found for the patients with tumor distance from areola edge ≥2.5 cm or tumor size≤5 cm, surgery with NAC preservation appears to be safe for the patients with breast cancer.