Rapid growth of malignant pleural mesothelioma

Our plain-English summary of Rapid growth of malignant pleural mesothelioma, by K. Kaira, K. Dobashi, N. Yanagitani, et al (Journal of Thoracic Oncology, 2007).

The study

• Authors: K. Kaira, K. Dobashi, N. Yanagitani, N. Sunaga, Y. Shimizu, T. Hisada, T. Ishizuka, T. Nakajima, M. Mori
• Journal: Journal of Thoracic Oncology
• Published: 2007;2(10):966-7
• Type of article: Case report
• Cited by: 4 articles, as counted by NIH iCite
• Read it: PubMed · Publisher

Summary of the article

This 'Image of the Month' report described a man with malignant pleural mesothelioma that grew very rapidly. The patient, a 67-year-old male smoker with no known asbestos exposure, was treated at Gunma University in Japan in 2006. He came in with a 4-day history of shortness of breath on exertion. Chest radiography showed a massive right-sided pleural effusion. A chest tube drained 3000 ml of serosanguineous fluid. Cytology of the pleural fluid was reported as adenocarcinoma. Serial chest CT scans on August 16, 21 and 24 showed the right pleural thickening progressing from partial to circumferential. His condition deteriorated because of uncontrollable pleural effusion, and he died on August 28, 2006. At autopsy, the tumour formed circumferential pleural thickening more than 1 cm thick, typical of diffuse malignant mesothelioma. Immunohistochemistry was positive for WT-1, weakly positive for calretinin, and negative for carcinoembryonic antigen, TTF-1 and Ber-EP4, confirming malignant pleural mesothelioma. There was no distant metastasis or left-sided involvement, and the left pleural effusion contained no malignant cells. The time from onset of symptoms to death was 2 weeks, so the definite diagnosis could not be made before the postmortem examination. The authors said the factors behind such rapid growth are unknown. They concluded that awareness that mesothelioma may progress so quickly may help in diagnosis.

PubMed has no abstract for this study, and the article doesn't print one. We wrote this summary from the full article with the help of AI. It is not the authors' wording.

In plain English

This was a case report about one patient, published as an "Image of the Month". A 67-year-old male smoker with no known asbestos exposure had four days of shortness of breath on exertion. A chest X-ray showed a large fluid collection around the right lung, and 3000 ml of blood-tinged fluid was drained. Cell testing of the fluid was read as adenocarcinoma. CT scans on August 16, 21 and 24 showed thickening of the right pleura (the lining around the lung) growing until it surrounded the lung. The patient died on August 28, 2006. At autopsy, the pleural thickening was more than 1 cm, and microscope and staining tests led to a definite diagnosis of malignant pleural mesothelioma. No distant spread or involvement of the left side of the chest was found. The authors reported 2 weeks between onset of symptoms and death, so the diagnosis could not be made before the post-mortem examination. The authors wrote that the factors behind such rapid growth are unknown. They concluded that awareness that this cancer can progress so quickly may help in diagnosis.

We wrote this plain-English summary from the full article with the help of AI, and a second AI model checked each sentence against the article. It is not the authors' wording; the abstract and the article are their own account.

What the study did and found

• Design: case report (single patient), published as an "Image of the Month"
• Who was studied: One 67-year-old male smoker referred to the authors' hospital (the authors are at Gunma University, Japan) in August 2006
• Exposure: No known asbestos exposure was reported for this patient. He was a smoker. No fiber type or product is named.
• Main results:
  • A chest tube drained 3000 ml of serosanguineous (blood-tinged) fluid from the right chest
  • Cytology of the pleural fluid was read as adenocarcinoma
  • By the August 24 CT scan, the right pleura showed circumferential thickening
  • The patient died on August 28, 2006
  • At autopsy the tumor formed circumferential pleural thickening exceeding 1 cm, typical of diffuse malignant mesothelioma
  • Immunohistochemistry: the tumor was positive for WT-1, weakly positive for calretinin, and negative for carcinoembryonic antigen, TTF-1 and Ber-EP4. A definite diagnosis of malignant pleural mesothelioma was made.
  • There was no evidence of distant metastasis, and the left pleural fluid contained no malignant cells
  • The time from onset of symptoms to death was 2 weeks, so a definite diagnosis could not be made before the post-mortem examination
• The authors' conclusion: The authors concluded that, although the factors behind rapid growth are unknown, awareness that malignant pleural mesothelioma may progress so quickly may help in diagnosis

Topics

The National Library of Medicine indexes this study under subjects our site covers: Mesothelioma.

Medical terms in this study, explained in our Lexicon: Pleural Mesothelioma, Asbestos Exposure, Pleural Effusion, Cytology, Adenocarcinoma, CT Scan, Pleural Thickening, Autopsy.

Related studies

• Rapid growth of a pleural mesothelioma — G.C. Lulenski, R. Pifarré, et al. (1971)
• Rapid progression of pleural disease due to exposure to Libby amphibole: "Not your grandfather's asbestos related disease" — B. Black, J. Szeinuk, et al. (2014)
• High performance of F-fluorodeoxyglucose positron emission tomography and contrast-enhanced CT in a rapid outpatient diagnostic program for patients with suspected lung cancer — P. Brocken, H.F. van der Heijden, et al. (2014)
• Elemental and immunohistochemical analysis of the lungs and hilar lymph node in a patient with asbestos exposure, a pilot study — Y. Koga, T. Satoh, et al. (2016)
• Inhibition of lung injury, inflammation, and interstitial pulmonary fibrosis by polyethylene glycol-conjugated catalase in a rapid inhalation model of asbestosis — B.T. Mossman, J.P. Marsh, et al. (1990)
• Rapid target gene validation in complex cancer mouse models using re-derived embryonic stem cells — I.J. Huijbers, R. Bin Ali, et al. (2014)

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