Imaging findings of papillary breast lesions: A pictorial review

The aim of this review is to describe the different imaging appearances of benign and malignant papillary breast lesions on mammography, ultrasound, and magnetic resonance imaging, according to the World Health Organization histopathological classifications. The classification and morphological imaging characteristics of papillary lesions remain challenging for pathologists and radiologists. Despite the difficulty of classifying these lesions, our review and those of others suggest that morphology is associated with clinically meaningful staging and outcome implications. Imaging can help to differentiate the forms of papillary lesion, but surgical specimens are required for definitive diagnosis in the majority of cases.