Inflammatory carcinoma of the breast. A Pathologic Definition

We examined the pathologic material and/or reports of all but one patient reported free of disease at least 5 years following radical mastectomy for inflammatory carcinoma of the breast. None of these patients had dermal lymphatic metastases. In addition, no patient with erythema of the breast or clinical inflammatory carcinoma who survived without recurrence 5 years following radical mastectomy (performed from 1950 to 1960 at the Barnes Hospital) had dermal lymphatic metastases. Inflammatory carcinoma is a poorly defined and confusing term which should be discarded. The histologic hallmark of surgically incurable carcinoma of the breast is tumor emboli in the dermal lymphatics. We propose the name “dermal lymphatic carcinomatosis of the breast” for this entity and stress the necessity of a palliative approach toward patients with this disease.