City docs cure African patient with rare form of skin cancer

 A 37-year-old African woman was cured of a rare form of skin cancer (Syringocystadeno carcinoma paplliferum) that appeared on her breast. Doctors who treated her claim that the case is the first of its kind detected and reported in the world.

“I could not bend due to the weight of the tumour and had to support it with my hand. I had lost all hope,” said Amina Abubakar, the patient who underwent the treatment.

The five-kg tumour that appeared on the woman’s breast was first diagnosed as breast cancer three years ago in her home country Nigeria. She was asked to take antibiotics which brought little change to her medical condition.

She was diagnosed with skin tumour (Syringocystadeno carcinoma paplliferum) by doctors at Cytecare Hospital and was advised surgery.

“The surgery took about five hours. We could identify that it was a skin cancer which had spread into her left breast and not breast cancer,” said Dr Anthony V Pais, head of oncoplastic breast surgery, Cytecare Cancer Hospital.

According to doctors who treated her, there have been just 12 to 15 incidents of this type of cancer, which appears on the scalp, neck, back, ear etc, while it is for the first time it was detected on the breast.

Dr Pais said that slow growth of the mole or a recent change in an apparent birthmark is a major indication of the disease.