Abstract. Lung cancer presenting with a giant atrial tumor thrombus is particularly rare. Surgical resection, aided by a cardiopulmonary bypass, is the standard treatment of choice if there is no distant metastasis. However, this form of surgery carries a high risk, with the subsequent patient prognosis being extremely poor. The current study describes the case of a 52-year-old man presenting with left lung squamous cell carcinoma that had extended into the left atrium. The patient was treated with stereotactic radiotherapy, and regarding the atrial disease, a complete response was achieved within 12 months. The present case demonstrates that stereotactic radiotherapy may be a beneficial palliative treatment for patients with stage IV lung cancer invading the left atrium. IntroductionAdvanced non-small cell lung cancer with associated atrial involvement is uncommon, occurring in ~10% of patients presenting with bronchogenic carcinoma (1,2). Patients with the disease usually possess circulatory and respiratory symptoms, and coughing, hemoptysis, dyspnea, weight loss and an extremely poor performance status are the typical associated features (3). Furthermore, an associated intra-atrial tumor thrombus is particularly rare, with tumor thrombi potentially leading to widespread systemic embolization and/or outflow tract obstruction (4-6). As a result, treatment is always warranted. If there is no presentation of distant metastasis, surgical resection is considered as the gold-standard therapy. However, chemotherapy may also be administered. Cases of non-small cell lung cancer with associated intra-atrial tumor thrombi are usually diagnosed using enhanced computed tomography (CT).Due to the rarity of this condition, incidence and mortality rates remain unknown, however, patient prognosis is extremely poor with an overall survival time of 4-17 months (1,7). The present study reports the case of a patient with stage IV lung cancer with invasion into the left atrium, for which a complete response was achieved following treatment with stereotactic radiotherapy. Case reportIn April 2012, a 52-year-old man was admitted to the Center of Radiation Oncology, Wujing Hospital (Shanghai, China) presenting with a 3-month history of progressive dyspnea and coughing. The patient also had a history of hypertension and smoking. An enhanced CT scan (Optima CT660 FREEdom; GE Healthcare, Piscataway, NJ, USA) revealed a left hilar tumor wrapped around the left pulmonary artery and vein, along with a large mass in the left atrium (Fig. 1A). A transbronchial biopsy was performed. Subsequently, tissue was formalin-fixed (Shanghai Ziyi Reagent Factory, Shanghai, China) paraffin-embedded (Leica Microsystems, Ltd., Milton Keynes, UK) and cut into 4 µm sections for hematoxylin and eosin (Baso Diagnostics Inc., Zhuhai, China) staining and immunohistochemistry. The biopsy revealed that the primary site was consistent with nests and trabecula of carcinoma cells proliferating with necrotic debris and intercellular bridges structures ( Fig. 2A and B)...

Abstract. Cases of hypoglossal schwannoma are extremely rare. Historically, microsurgical resection has been the standard treatment, but it may not always be feasible; thus, it is crucial to investigate alternative treatments. We herein present the cases of two patients, both of whom presented with tongue deviation and hemiatrophy, accompanied by headaches. Magnetic resonance imaging revealed a dumbbell-shaped tumor originating from the hypoglossal nerve that was adjacent to the cranial base in each patient. Hypofractionated stereotactic radiotherapy was used to treat the tumors, with a total dose of 30 Gy in 3-Gy fractions delivered to the planning target volume. Several months later, the tumors had significantly decreased in size and the symptoms of the two patients had gradually improved.

No abstract

Review question / Objective: To study the transient and long-term neural effects when acupuncture at ST36 acupoint in healthy subjects. Rationale: ST 36 (zusanli) is commonly used in the clinical practice of acupuncture in Chinese medicine. However, how acupuncture at ST 36 modulates neural activity across various brain regions is still l a c k i n g u n c l e a r. T h e a d v a n c e s i n noninvasive neuroimaging techniques, such as EEG, MRI, fNIRS, etc., allow researchers to study the mechanism of acupuncture in vivo or even in humans. There are emerging neuroimaging studies, INPLASY 1 International Platform of Registered Systematic Review and Meta-analysis Protocols