A Case of Spontaneously Ruptured Anaplastic Carcinoma (Giant Cell Type) of the Pancreas with Intraabdominal Hemorrhage

Yoshiyuki Matsumura, Kazuhiro Iwai, Ryosuke Kawasaki, Aya Matsui, Seiji Mega, Masaomi Ichinokawa, Toru Takahashi, Masaki Miyamoto*, Satoshi Hirano* and Satoshi Kondo*

Department of Surgery, Oji General Hospital
Department of Surgical Oncology, Division of Cancer Medicine, Hokkaido University Graduate School of Medicine*

We report a case of spontaneously ruptured anaplastic carcinoma of the pancreas. A 59-year-old man seen for abdominal pain was found in abdominal ultrasonography and computed tomography (CT) to have a tumor of the pancreatic body and multiple metastatic liver tumors. He was admitted due to exacerbated symptoms. Abdominal CT showed a rapidly expanding tumor and marked ascites. Exploratory needle aspiration showed hemorrhagic ascites, necessitating emergency surgery under a diagnosis of intraabdominal hemorrhage. During surgery, we found bleeding from a ruptured tumor and conducted distal pancreatectomy. The pathological diagnosis was anaplastic carcinoma of the pancreas. Despite postoperative chemotherapy, the man died of cancerous cachexia on postoperative day 18. Anaplastic carcinoma thus may cause spontaneous rupture during rapid tumor enlargement.

Key words
anaplastic carcinoma, intraabdominal hemorrhage

Reprint requests
Yoshiyuki Matsumura Department of Surgical Oncology, Division of Cancer Medicine, Hokkaido University Graduate School of Medicine
Kita-15 Nishi-7 Kita-ku, Sapporo, 060-8638 JAPAN

Accepted
October 25, 2006

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