Paget’s disease of the nipple may exist as an isolated condition or may be associated with breast cancer. Paget’s disease-associated breast cancer may be intraductal or invasive; depending on location, it may be retromamillary or peripheral. Surgical treatment consists in sparing procedure or breast amputation. Patients with Paget’s disease coexisting with an infiltrating breast cancer, should undergo sentinel node biopsy or axillary lymphadenectomy. Bilateral breast cancer is diagnosed in women diagnosed with primary cancer in both breasts. This definition does not include metastases of unilateral breast cancer to contralateral breast. Recommended type of surgical treatment is bilateral mastectomy and bilateral biopsy of sentinel node or axillary lymphadenectomy. Sparing treatment is a therapeutic option applicable in reference centers only. Isolated metastases of other tumors to the breasts are very rare. The usual origin of breast metastases is contralateral breast cancer. Less frequent are secondary foci of lymphoma and melanoma. Management strategy depends on what type of malignant tumor was the source of metastases. The cornerstone of treatment is usually systemic treatment, if available. Surgical treatment is limited to surgical biopsy or palliative treatment (e.g. mastectomy due to bleeding from the tumor). Occult breast cancer is diagnosed in women with metastases of adenomatous cancer, non-differentiated or non-classified to axillary lymph nodes, when neither physical nor radiological examination reveal a primary breast cancer. The most probable origin of axillary metastases is breast cancer. Surgical treatment consists in axillary lymphadenectomy and mastectomy. One may withhold from mastectomy if spared breast will undergo total radiotherapy. Breast cancer in the elderly, i.e. persons over 70, accounts for over 30% of all breast cancer cases. Surgical treatment of elderly women with breast cancer should be based on standard protocols (mastectomy or sparing treatment; biopsy of sentinel node and/or axillary lymphadenectomy). Standard treatment protocol can and should be modified when treatment-associated risk exceeds expected benefits thereof.

Paget’s disease of the nipple, bilateral breast cancer, isolated metastases of other tumors to the breast, occult breast cancer, breast cancer in the elderly