[For cytological diagnosis of breast tumours]

[Breast cytopathology bestiary]

Breast cytopathology of tubular and lobular carcinomas may be very difficult. Indeed, the classical morphological signs of malignancy are often scarce or absent; the identification of special patterns of cell clusters may therefore be very useful to reach a diagnosis. Following the review of many cases of cytological smears with histological confirmation, a series of peculiar cytological aspects (often mimicking little animals such as butterfly, eagle, dog, lizard, fish, rabbit...) were identified and found helpful to report here from a diagnostic point of view.