Metaplastic breast carcinomas (MBCs) are rare primary breast malignancies characterized histologically by carcinoma of two epithelial types or co-existence of carcinoma with non-epithelial cellular elements. They are aggressive tumours that carry poor prognosis. We reviewed the pathologic features and clinical outcomes of MBCs seen in our institution between the years 2000 to 2007. Out of 471 breast cancer patients, six female patients were histologically-proven to have MBCs giving an incidence rate of 1.3%. The patients comprised four Malays and two Indians and their mean age was 51 years old. Five patients underwent mastectomy (four with axillary clearance and one without) and one had wide local excision with axillary clearance. Axillary lymph node involvement was seen in four patients (three with epithelial only type tumour and one with the biphasic tumour). In all the cases, the tumours were bigger than 5 cm in diameter (T3), grade 3 and estrogen receptor negative. Five patients received chemotherapy while one refused. All of the patients had tumour recurrence with a mean time of recurrence of 9 months. In conclusion, metaplastic breast carcinomas are rare and aggressive tumours usually affect the post menopausal age group. They present as aggressive, large sized, high grade tumours that are estrogen receptor negative. Tumour size and axillary lymph node involvement indicate poor prognosis. Despite treatment with chemotherapy and radiotherapy, these patients have high risk of local recurrence and distant metastases which are potentially fatal.

Breast cancer is the most common cancer among Malaysian women. This study aimed to determine the reproductive for premenopausal breast cancer risk in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. A case-control study was conducted in 216 histopathologically confirmed cases of premenopausal breast cancer and 216 community-based controls that were matched by age within a 5-year period and ethnicity. The results of this study showed that premenopausal breast cancer risks were strongly related to parity, number of live births and family history of breast cancer. Premenopausal women with these known reproductive and family history risk factors should take extra measures to undergo appropriate screening method for early detection of breast cancer

Thyroid nodules are common but thyroid malignancies are not. Fine needle aspiration (FNA) cytology is a diagnostic tool used to screen patients with thyroid nodules who require surgery. We study the diagnostic accuracy of FNA as the initial diagnostic modality in the clinical assessment of thyroid nodules. Between January 1995 until December 2000, 2131 FNA of thyroid nodules were performed. Four hundred and forty-one (20.7%) of these were unsatisfactory and 1690 (79.3%) cases were satisfactory for cytological evaluation. Histopathological diagnosis were available for 361 cases. Cyto-histopathological correlation was carried out for these cases. Our results showed a diagnostic accuracy of 96.2% with sensitivity and specificity rates of 87.7% and 98.4% respectively. Our positive predictive value is 93.4% and our negative predictive value is 96.8%. From this study, we conclude that fine needle aspiration is an important initial screening diagnostic tool for the investigation of thyroid nodules.