Epidemiology of Inflammatory Breast Cancer (IBC)1

Issue title: Inflammatory Breast Cancer

Guest editors: Sandra Swain

Article type: Research Article

Authors: Anderson, William F.^{a; *} | Schairer, Catherine^a | Chen, Bingshu E.^a | Hance, Kenneth W.^a | Levine, Paul H.^b

Affiliations: [a] DHHS/NIH/NCI/DCP, Rockville, MD, USA | [b] The George Washington University School of Public Health and Health Sciences Washington, DC, USA | NCI, NIH, Bethesda, MD, USA

Correspondence: [*] Corresponding author: Descriptive Studies Section, Biostatistics Branch, DHHS/NIH/NCI/DCEG, EPS, Room 8036, 6120 Executive Blvd, Rockville, MD 20852-7244, USA. Tel.: +1 301 594 9125; Fax: +1 301 402 0081; E-mail: wanderso@mail.nih.gov

Abstract: Inflammatory breast cancer (IBC) is a rare and aggressive form of breast cancer with unknown etiology and generally poor outcome. It is characterized by diffuse edema (peau d'orange) and redness (erythema), although either the disease itself or case definitions have varied over time and place, confounding temporal trends and geographic variations. In this review, we discuss case definitions for IBC and its clinical characteristics; describe its geographic variation, age and racial distribution, incidence and survival patterns, and summarize the very limited information on its epidemiologic risk factors. We also incorporate emerging data from the National Cancer Institute's (NCI) Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results (SEER) Program.

Keywords: Inflammatory breast cancer, epidemiology, etiologic factors

DOI: 10.3233/BD-2006-22103

Journal: Breast Disease, vol. 22, no. 1, pp. 9-23, 2006