Medullary thyroid carcinoma (MTC), a neuroendocrine tumor arising from the thyroid gland, is known to be poorly responsive to conventional chemotherapy. The root of Stemona tuberosa Lour, also called Bai Bu, is a commonly used traditional Chinese anti-tussive medicine. The present study investigated this medicinal herb for the first time with respect to its anticancer activity in human medullar...

BACKGROUND Single soft tissue metastasis of medullary thyroid carcinoma is extremely rare. In addition, several occult medullary thyroid carcinomas with distant metastasis were reported, but undetectable primary lesion at diagnosis was also extremely rare. CASE PRESENTATION A 74-year-old man was admitted to our hospital because of a painful nodule in his left buttock for over 1 year. Needle b...

Using immunohistochemistry, Fas/Apo-1 protein expression was investigated in thyroid cancers of 67 patients. Thyroid biopsies from twenty eight patients with benign thyroid diseases were also examined. The patients with thyroid cancer manifested a variable histology of the cancer, including 14 patients with follicular carcinoma, 48 with papillary carcinoma, 5 patients with medullary carcinoma. ...

A 64-year-old man presented with elevated thyrocalcitonin, and a history of resected thyroid medullary carcinoma. Cervical thymus was detected incidentally in the neck dissection resection specimen for thyroid medullary carcinoma extension. This case was peculiar due to the presence of a thymic microcyst and the coexistence of parathyroid tissue along with the thymic lobules. Persistent hypocal...

Three infants, who presented with intestinal obstruction due to diffuse transmural intestinal ganglioneuromatosis, are described. Mutation analysis of exon 16 of the RET proto-oncogene revealed germline M918T and thus, a molecular diagnosis of multiple endocrine neoplasia type 2B (MEN 2B). Two infants developed medullary carcinoma of the thyroid. The third had a prophylactic thyroidectomy despi...

Transarterial chemoembolisation (TACE) is well established in the treatment of primary hepatocellular carcinoma and of metastatic disease from colorectal and neuroendocrine tumours. There are few published studies on the effectiveness of treating hepatic metastases from medullary thyroid carcinoma with chemoembolisation and none to our knowledge utilising bland particle transarterial embolisati...

A 40 year old man with multiple endocrine neoplasia type 2b (MEN 2b) presented with cholecystitis caused by gall stones. Twenty four years earlier, he had had a partial thyroidectomy for a cold nodule. At his initial presentation MEN 2b with medullary carcinoma of the thyroid had not been made. This was diagnosed while investigating his gall bladder symptoms and he was found to have asymptomati...

This review highlights the difference between so-called medullary carcinoma and lymphoepithelioma-like carcinoma with reference to the gastrointestinal tract. The two terms have been applied synonymously in the gastrointestinal tract, with the majority of carcinomas associated with lymphocytes being termed medullary carcinomas. True medullary carcinomas are disposed in syncytial sheets and have...