A CASE OF 20-YEAR-OLD FEMALE WITH ESOPHAGEAL CANCER

Abstract

We present a 20-year-old female patient with advanced esophageal cancer. The patient visited our hospital with the chief complaints of dysphagia and body weight loss. Roentgenological examination revealed a stenotic lesion at the upper third portion of the esophagus (Iu-Im). The stenosis was also confirmed endoscopically at 25 cm from the foreteeth. The histological diagnosis of endoscopically biopsied specimen was moderately differentiated squamous cell carcinoma. The patient was admitted to the hospital. After pre-operative radiation therapy, total thoracic esophagostomy and partial gastrectomy was performed. The main lesion of the surgically resected specimen was histologically almost scarred and there were moderately differentiated squamous carcinoma cells left in the lamina propria. In addition to the main tumor, another lesion was found at the lower site of the resected esophagus. The second lesion was histologically diagnosed as poorly differentiated squamous cell carcinoma with invasion to the muscularis mucosa. Very few cases of esophageal cancer in patients under the age of 29 have been reported in Japan. To our knowledge, the present case may be the youngest example of the esophageal cancer without any congenital anomalies among the similar cases reported so far in this country.