Endocrine Abstracts

Objective: The evidence regarding association between thyroid diseases and benign and malign breast diseases is increasing. It has been shown that thyroid disorders are more frequent in those with benign breast diseases and that different thyroid diseases have associations with benign and malign breast diseases and their outcomes. In this study, we aimed to reveal the frequency of benign breast conditions in patients with nodular thyroid disease and Hashimoto’s disease.

Design: Seventy-one women with nodular thyroid disease, ninety-five women with Hashimoto’s disease and as a control group, 72 euthyroid cases were included in the study. A detailed clinical assessment of the participants was carried out, serum thyroid stimulating hormone, free triiodothyronine, free thyroxine and thyroid peroxidase autoantibody levels were measured, and thyroid and breast ultrasonography were performed by a single operator in order to determine thyroid and breast pathology.

Results: Benign breast diseases were detected in 55.7% of patients with nodular thyroid diseases, in 47.4% of those with Hashimoto’s disease and 29.2% of control group in the study. The results showed that the frequency of benign breast diseases was significantly higher in nodular thyroid disease and Hashimoto’s disease than the control group (P<0.01 and P<0.01 respectively). Simple cyst was found to be the most frequent pathology among benign breast diseases; fibrocystic changes, mixed lesions, benign solid mass, ductal ectasia and complex cyst followed it. No significant relation was found regarding thyroid function and autoimmunity in patients diagnosed with benign breast disease (P>0.05).

Conclusion: The results of our study supports the presence of an association between benign breast conditions and thyroid diseases. An important implication of this finding may be a reasonable role of scanning for potential breast pathology in women with nodular or autoimmune thyroid disease in clinical practice.