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Vol.43 No.3 contents | Japanese/English |
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- Original Article -
Clinicopathological Study of Adenocarcinoma of the Lung With Signet-ring Cell Elements -Four Case Reports and a Review of the Literature-
Takuji Kiryu1, Nobuko Ohashi1, Keiko Sugisaki1, Eisuke Matsui1, Hiroaki Hoshi1, Tsutomu Marui2, Hisashi Iwata2, Kuniyasu Shimokawa3, Shimpei Kawaguchi4, Mitsuharu Kokubo41Department of Radiology, 2The First Department of Surgery, 3Department of Laboratory Medicine, Gifu University School of Medicine, Japan, 4Kizawa Memorial Hospital, Japan
Objective. The aim of this study is to evaluate clinicopathological characteristics of lung adenocarcinoma with signet-ring cell elements. Patients and Methods. We reviewed 4 patients encountered during the past 12 years. We evaluated the clinical findings (age, sex, smoking history, clinical stage, and operability) and imaging and pathological findings (size, location, internal and marginal characteristics, vascular convergence, differentiation, involvement of adjacent and remote organs and pathological stage). Results. The incidence was only 0.82% (4 of 488) among all pathologically proven pulmonary adenocarcinomas for the past 12 years. One case was a 39-year-old man. Imaging findings showed solid, well-defined, and marginal irregular lesions associated with vascular convergence. Ground-glass opacity was not detected in the periphery of the lesions. All cases revealed advanced status with involvement of the regional lymph nodes, adjacent, or remote organs. The clinical and/or pathological stage were IIB, IIIA, IIIB, and IV, respectively. Only one case underwent surgical resection, but this case died of recurrence 11 months after operation. Other cases were inoperable and had poor prognoses. Conclusion. We suggest that adenocarcinoma of the lung with signet-ring cell elements shows aggressive behavior and poor outcome. We need further evaluation of this rare entity, categorized as one of the variants of adenocarcinoma of the lung in the revised WHO classification.
key words: Lung adenocarcinoma, Mucous-producing adenocarcinoma, Bronchial gland cell type adenocarcinoma, Signet-ring cell adenocarcinoma, WHO histological typing of lung and pleural tumours
Received: January 17, 2003
Accepted: March 12, 2003
JJLC 43 (3): 253-257, 2003
