Case Report
Congestive Heart Failure versus
Inflammatory Carcinoma in Breast
A. Alikhassi,
1
R. Omranipour,
1
and Z. Alikhassy
2
1
Breast Clinic, Cancer Institute, Tehran University of Medical Science, Tehran 1419733141, Iran
2
Emergency Department, Isfahan University, Iran
Correspondence should be addressed to A. Alikhassi; afsanehalikhassi@yahoo.co.uk
Received 1 February 2014; Accepted 16 March 2014; Published 7 April 2014
Academic Editor: Atsushi Komemushi
Copyright © 2014 A. Alikhassi et al. his is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License,
which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
Inlammatory breast cancer is a rare highly malignant form of breast cancer. Clinical signs and symptoms with histologic
examination usually conirm the diagnosis. here are rare reports of breast edema of congestive heart failure which were diicult to
diferentiate from inlammatory carcinoma. he diferential becomes more diicult when congestive heart failure is associated with
unilateral breast edema. We present a case of a 70-year-old woman with congestive heart failure associated with unilateral breast
edema and skin thickening simulating inlammatory breast carcinoma on mammography.
1. Introduction
Congestive heart failure is a common disease especially in
elderly population. Its common presentations are well known
such as dyspnea, fatigue, weakness, swelling in legs, increased
need to urinate at night, and lack of appetite, but familiarizing
with the rare presentations of this common disease is also
important to prevent unnecessary treatments, cost, and mor-
bidity. We report a rare case of unilateral breast enlargement
in an elderly woman with congestive heart failure who was
clinically suspicious of inlammatory breast cancer.
2. Case Presentation
A 70-year-old retired woman presented in breast clinic of
cancer institute with complaint of gradual enlargement of
right breast with peau d’orange appearance and pitting edema
without accompanying arm edema and exertional dyspnea,
which happened gradually during the last few months. She
did not have fever or dermal erythema. She did not give any
history of breast trauma or any previous surgery. She had a
past medical history of congestive heart failure (EF 30%).
On clinical exam, the patient was cooperative and
tachypnoeic and had heart rate of 70/min, regular rhythm,
and blood pressure of 130/70 mmHg. here were bilateral
crepitations of the lungs, more in the right side. here were
bilateral legs pitting edema. Abdominal exam was normal.
Clinical breast examination showed an enlarged right
breast mainly in dependent part with difusely thickened
peau d’orange skin. here was no nipple discharge, nipple
retraction, palpable breast mass, or palpable axillary lym-
phadenopathy.
Full digital mammography revealed skin thickening,
cooper ligaments thickening, and edema without any appar-
ent mass. Some punctate benign-type microcalciications also
spread in both breasts (Figures 1 and 2).
Ultrasound showed skin thickening, trabecular promi-
nancy, and generalized mild tissue distortion due to edema
without apparent mass (Figure 3).
Her chest X-ray showed cardiac enlargement and right-
side pleural efusion (Figure 4).
She was a known case of congestive heart failure with low
ejection fraction. Heart failure was considered as a diferential
diagnosis for more important inlammatory breast cancer
despite, breast edema due to heart failure is a rare entity. We
recommended conirming diagnosis by tissue biopsy (skin
punch biopsy for ruling out inlammatory breast cancer), but
she refused. Alternatively, diuretics were prescribed and she
Hindawi Publishing Corporation
Case Reports in Radiology
Volume 2014, Article ID 815896, 4 pages
http://dx.doi.org/10.1155/2014/815896