Mammary Tuberculosis: A case series of six patients and review of literature

Abstract

carcinoma breast or pyogenic breast abscess because of its non specific clinical and radiological findings. Microscopy and culture are frequently negative because of its paucibacillary nature and the diagnosis is often one of exclusion. We present a case series of six consecutive patients with mammary tuberculosis, seen over a six month period (June 2013 to December 2013) from SHKM, GMC Mewat, Haryana. Case presentation: Cases with either histopathological diagnosis of necrotizing granulomatous mastitis with or without acid fast bacilli positivity, cytopathological diagnosis of necrotizing granulomatous mastitis with or without acid fast bacilli positivity or both were included in the study. Their clinical, radiological and pathological data was reviewed. All the patients were women. The average age at presentation was 29.16 years (24 to 40 years). All the six cases were initially subjected to Fine Needle Aspiration Cytology (FNAC). Excision biopsy was done in only four cases. Final diagnosis was obtained via FNAC (2 cases), excision biopsy (4 cases). Acid fast bacilli were seen on Ziehl-Neelsen (ZN) staining on histopathology in one out of four cases and in two out of six cases on FNAC. Conclusion: Mammary tuberculosis typically presents with lump in breast and being an uncommon disease,
can be mistaken as carcinoma breast or breast abscess. The diagnosis can be established or suggested by FNAC in majority of cases.