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Vol.58 No.4 contents | Japanese/English |
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- Case Report -
Primary Small Cell Carcinoma in the Trachea
Munetake Takata1, Yuki Yoshimatsu2, Kazushi Yamairi3, Naomi Maruyama4, Takao Kamimori1, Kayo Ueda51Department of Respiratory Medicine, Yodogawa Christian Hospital, Japan, 2Department of Respiratory Medicine, Iizuka Hospital, Japan, 3Osaka City University Hospital, Japan, 4Department of Respiratory Medicine, Izumiotsu Municipal Hospital, Japan, 5Department of Pathology, Osaka Habikino Medical Center, Japan
Background. There are few Japanese reports of cases with localized tracheal small cell carcinoma. Case. A 73-year-old man, who underwent a left upper lobectomy for squamous cell carcinoma (Stage IA) at 66 years of age, presented with hemosputum. Bronchoscopy showed multiple nodes in the trachea. The lesions spread 9 cm distally from the subglottis. The histological diagnosis was small cell carcinoma. We suspected the lesion to be metastatic because tumor cells were found submucosally. However, no primary tumor could be found on either whole body CT or whole body FDG-PET. Therefore, treatment was planned based on a diagnosis of limited-stage small cell cancer. Concurrent chemo-radiotherapy was initiated, but only one course of carboplatin and etoposide could be administered due to prolonged platelet depletion. As a result, the treatment was then altered to radical irradiation (30 fractions of 2 Gy). The patient maintained a complete response for 16 months after beginning the treatment. However, a nodule was later found in the left lower lobe of the lung which was diagnosed to be recurrent small cell cancer by bronchoscopy. The patient eventually died 25 months after beginning the treatment. Conclusion. We herein described a rare case of localized tracheal small cell carcinoma which recurred after chemo-radiotherapy. It is necessary to collect more data on tracheal small cell cancer in order to elucidate the characteristics of this type of cancer.
key words: Small cell carcinoma, Tracheal cancer
Received: October 19, 2017
Accepted: May 14, 2018
JJLC 58 (4): 281-285, 2018
