Clinicopathologic change of gastrointestinal stromal tumor after neoadjuvant imatinib followed by surgical resection / 대한외과학회지

A 53-year-old woman was diagnosed with gastrointestinal stromal tumor (GIST) of the stomach. Computed tomography (CT) revealed a huge mass (12 cm in diameter), likely to invade pancreas and spleen. In the operation field, the tumor was in an unresectable state. The patient was then started on imatinib therapy for 4 months. On follow-up imaging studies, the tumor almost disappeared. We performed total gastrectomy and splenectomy upon which two small-sized residual tumors were found on microscopy. In this paper, we describe a case of clinicopathologic change in unresectable GIST after neoadjuvant imatinib mesylate.

Intrahepatic Splenosis Mimicking Liver Metastasis in a Patient with Gastric Cancer

A 54 year old man was referred to our hospital with gastric cancer. The patient had a history of splenectomy and a left nephrectomy as a result of a traffic accident 15 years earlier. The endoscopic findings were advanced gastric cancer at the lower body of the stomach. Abdominal ultrasonography (USG) and magnetic resonance imaging demonstrated a metastatic nodule in the S2 segment of the liver. Eventually, the clinical stage was determined to be cT2cN1cM1 and a radical distal gastrectomy, lateral segmentectomy of the liver were performed. The histopathology findings confirmed the diagnosis of intrahepatic splenosis, omental splenosis. Hepatic splenosis is not rare in patients with a history of splenic trauma or splenectomy. Nevertheless, this is the first report describing a patient with gastric cancer and intrahepatic splenosis that was misinterpreted as a liver metastatic nodule. Intra-operative USG guided fine needle aspiration should be considered to avoid unnecessary liver resections in patients with a suspicious hepatic metastasis.

Gemcitabine-based Chemotherapy for Gallbladder Cancer

PURPOSE: Patients with gallbladder cancer tend to have advanced, unresectable tumor at the time of presentation and they face a dismal prognosis in the absence of a standard chemotherapy regimen. This study was performed to evaluate the outcomes of patients with gallbladder cancer and who underwent postoperative gemcitabine-based chemotherapy. METHODS: From March of 2001 to February of 2008, a total of 27 patients underwent operation for gallbladder cancer. They underwent two types of gemcitabine-based chemotherapy. One type of regimen was the combined administration of gemcitabine 1,000 mg/m2 and 5-fluorouracil 200 mg/m2. The other one was combined administration of gemcitabine 1,000 mg/m2 and cisplatin 70 mg/m2. RESULTS: Among the 27 patients, 15 patients were treated with gemcitabine-based chemotherapy and 12 patients were treated with many kinds of the best supportive care without chemotherapy. The median survival was 29.1+/-2.7 months and 15.7+/-2.8 months, respectively. The median survival and disease free survival for the gemcitabine based chemotherapy group who received curative resection was 31.6+/-2.5 and 15.7+/-3.2 months, respectively. The median survival and disease free survival for the patients without chemotherapy after curative resection was 16.3+/-2.9 and 15.7+/-3.2 months, respectively. CONCLUSION: Patients with gallbladder cancer and who received adjuvant gemcitabine-based chemotherapy had a relatively favorable prognosis. Especially, gemcitabine-based combination chemotherapy could be effective and acceptable for the treatment of gallbladder cancer patients who have undergone curative resection.