Skull base metastasis of a breast carcinoma

Skull base metastases from primary malignant tumors are relatively uncommon lesions. They usually originate from the breast, lung, prostate, skin, liver and cervix. We report a case of a 76 years old female complaining of dizziness, mild left hearing loss, tinnitus and recurring left facial paresis. A computed tomography scan of the temporal bones documented a much extended osteolytic lesion of the left temporal bone. A left mastoidectomy evidenced a soft-tissue etheroplastic mass involving diffusely the middle ear. Several bioptic specimens were obtained and the definite histopathological response was breast lobular carcinoma metastasiss.