Jin L, et al. – This retrospective study was executed to discover the predictors of malignancy for female patients with suspicious nipple discharge (ND). For this group of patients, older age and the presence of suspicious lumps were predictors of the presence of malignancy.

Methods

• Patients with suspicious ND who underwent surgical treatment at the center between January 2007 and December 2014 were incorporated in this study.
• Experts compared clinicopathological features between patients with and without malignancy.
• For identification of predictors of malignancy, Chi-square test and a logistic regression model as the univariate and multivariate analysis were used.

Results

• This study involved 334 eligible patients.
• As per the observation, the median age of the study population was 45 (range=19-81) years.
• Breast cancer was noticed in 18.0% (60/334) of the entire study population.
• An association of older age (p=0.002) and presence of suspicious lumps (p<0.001) with malignancy was observed.
• They did not notice any significant association between presence of bloody discharge and malignancy (p=0.324).
• Older age (p=0.023) and presence of suspicious lumps (p<0.001) were affirmed as independent predictors of malignancy.
• No link was found between the presence of bloody discharge and malignancy, for patients without suspicious lumps.
• Tumor size was significantly associated with malignancy (p<0.001), in patients with suspicious lumps.