Abstract: Objective: To study the diagnostic value of nipple discharge in exfoliative cytologywith ductoscopic ductal lavage.Methods: A total of 76 patients with nipple discharge were examinedby fiberoptic ductoscopy. Exfoliative cytology of nipple aspiration was performed before ductoscopy ex-amination. Abnormal intraduct of breast lesions were scraped with biopsy needle under ductoscopy andthen the ducts were washed with 0.9% NS solution. The ductal lavage was collected for exfoliative cy-tology.Results: Thirty patients with mild redness of ductal menbrance or mammary ductal ectasia werenot operated. Forty-six patients with intraductal protruded lesion underwent regional excision. Patholog-ical findings showed there ws the early breast cancer in 10 patients, papilloma in 32 and fibrocysticdisease in 4. In all patients, the ductal lavage obtained more adequate specimens than nipple aspiration(P<0.01). The diagnostic accuracy of exfoliative cytology in ductal lavage was significantly higher thanthat of the nipple aspiration in 10 patients with early breast cancer (P<0.05).Conclusion: The resultsshow that ductoscopic ductal lavage in nipple discharge can provide much more adequate specimens forexfoliative cytology and increase the diagnostic accuracy on nipple discharge.