How to Approach Symptomatic Breast
摘要
Breast symptoms are common in clinical practice with more than a quarter of females affected by breast disease once in their lifetime. Palpable breast mass, mastalgia and nipple discharge are the commonly encountered symptoms. The vast majority of patients presenting with breast symptoms are diagnosed with benign breast disease. A multidisciplinary team forms the basis of breast approach to management, and all patients with breast symptoms should undergo triple assessment. The aim of clinical and imaging evaluation of these patients is to institute appropriate treatment and exclude any underlying breast malignancy. The various imaging modalities available for evaluation of breast-related symptoms include mammography, breast ultrasound and breast Magnetic Resonance Imaging. It is essential to formulate an approach to investigate breast-related symptoms, which is simple to follow, avoids over-investigation in benign cases and prevents misdiagnosis in malignant lesions. This chapter outlines multimodality imaging assessment of the patients presenting with breast symptoms based on patient’s demography and results of clinical breast examination. The results of imaging are communicated in terms of BI-RADS category which guides further management.