Woman started pouring milk through her armpits after giving birth
After giving birth, a woman noticed that she was producing milk both from her mammary glands and from her armpits. It happened in the Philippines.
The 35-year-old woman, who had recently had a baby, went to the hospital after noticing that she had swelling in both armpits after breastfeeding the newborn.
The swellings were irregular in shape and similar in color to the skin, measuring, as detailed in the case report, at JAAD case reports5.5 by 4.2 centimeters in the right armpit and 3.9 by 0.9 centimeters in the left armpit.
The masses were not painful, did not hemorrhage, nor were they abnormally warm to the touch. When doctors massaged the swollen areas in the armpits, droplets of milk came out of the hair follicles.
But that wasn’t the first time this had happened to him. According to the woman, similar swellings had first appeared 15 years earlier, after the birth of her first child.
She said the swelling went down after she stopped breastfeeding, but reappeared after subsequent births. After weaning the babies, the armpit masses disappeared.
As Live Science details, tissue analysis confirmed that the nodules were polimastiaalso known as ectopic or accessory breasts.
The term ectopic refers to tissues that appear in locations other than those where they are normally found.
As the same magazine explains, accessory breasts originate from a thickened line of tissue called the mammary crest, which forms in the uterus. Also called the milk line, this ridge is where the rudimentary precursors of the mammary glands develop.
Although rare, the Ectopic breast tissue can grow in men or women at any point along the milk line. However, it is most often found in the armpit. On rare occasions, it forms on the face or back.
Sometimes, the accessory breasts develop enough to include an areola and a nipple.
According to the case report, the condition affects about 2% to 6% of women and 1% to 3% of men. The condition may be hereditary and is estimated to be transmitted in around 6% of cases.
