A Case of Superficial Esophageal Cancer with a Long Stenotic Lesion

Motohito Nakagawa, Nobutoshi Ando, Soji Ozawa, Michio Sato, Yoshifumi Ikeda, Yoshihiro Imazu, Akihiko Tamura, Masaki Kitajima

Department of Surgery, School of Medicine, Keio University

A case of superficial esophageal cancer with a long stenotic lesion in which almost all depths of invasion were limited to the epithelial layer, is reported. The patient was a 49-year-old man with a chief complaint of dysphagia. An esophagogram and esophagoscopy showed a 10 cm stenotic lesion without protrusion or depression in the CeIu region. Endoscopic iodine staining revealed many spotted unstained lesions in the stenotic area, and a biopsy proved the lesions to be squamous cell carcinoma. Total thoracic esophagectomy with regional lymph node dissection under right thoracotomy and a gastric tube reconstruction in the posterior mediastinal route were performed. Histopathological results were sm, ie (+), n (-) (0/48), ly (-), v (-). The cancer cells stayed within the epithelium except in one 3 mm area that invaded the lamina muscularis mucosae. This case was thought to be a multicentric cancer spreading in the epithelial layer. The stenosis might be referred not only to the inflammatory change but also to the lymphocyte infiltration of the mucosal layer as an immunological reaction to cancer cells.

Key words
superficial esophageal cancer, esophageal stenosis

Reprint requests
Motohito Nakagawa Department of Surgery, School of Medicine, Keio University
35 Shinanomachi, Shinjuku-ku, Tokyo, 160 JAPAN

Accepted
April 14, 1993

To read the PDF file you will need Abobe Reader installed on your computer.