Pancreatic carcinosarcoma with rare long-term survival

Abstract

Patient concerns:We report a rare case of pancreatic carcinosarcoma involving a 44-year-old woman. The patient complained of discomfort associated with the upper abdomen and jaundice of skin and sclera for 1 week.Diagnoses:After hospitalization, relevant examinations were completed. The disease was diagnosed as carcinoma of the pancreatic head.Interventions:Whipple procedure was conducted in May 2013. Intraoperative exploration indicated 2 components of the tumor: a fish-shaped gray matter and a hard structure similar to cancellous bone. Histopathological examination showed adenocarcinoma and osteosarcoma. After surgery, the patient received 8 cycles of chemotherapy with gemcitabine and raltitrexed.Outcomes:Previous studies indicated poor prognosis for pancreatic carcinosarcoma. However, our patient survived for 31 months with no recurrence till date.Lessons subsections:Coexistence of pancreatic adenocarcinoma and osteosarcoma is very rare. Our case was also an exception in manifesting longer survival than expected.

Systemic Chemotherapy for Advanced Rare Pancreatic Histotype Tumors

“…Gemcitabine alone resulted ineffective in 2 advanced cases. 103,106 Among 4 of our 5 patients, 2 were treated with gemcitabine plus nab-paclitaxel, and 2 were treated with gemcitabine plus FU. All of them showed a PD with an OS equal to or shorter than 5 months.…”

“…Pancreatic carcinosarcoma is a very rare histotype of pancreatic cancer with approximately only 20 cases reported in the literature. 102,103 Gelos et al 104 reviewed 7 cases, with an OS after surgery of 6 months. Jia et al 103 considered 19 cases and calculated an mOS of 9 months using the Kaplan-Meier method including cases of all stages.…”

Long Progression-free-survival Pancreatic Carcinosarcoma Under Gemcitabine-nabpaclitaxel First Line Chemotherapy

“…Most common symptoms are abdominal pain, obstructive jaundice, anorexia, nausea and vomiting. Some of the most common signs are anemia, deep vein thrombosis, glucose abnormality and CA-19.9 elevation [19] .…”

Sarcomatoid carcinoma of the pancreas: A case report and review of the literature

“…In the present case, the small mass (which was invading the bile duct) was not clearly shown by radiography; however, the dilation of the bile ducts and gallbladder provided indirect evidence for the tumor. In magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), SCP shows abnormal signals, such as high or low signals in T2 weighted imaging (12,13). Enhanced MRI is valuable for estimating the extent of local malignant involvement.…”