Abstract
We report an inoperable case of small cell carcinoma of the esophagus, which disappeared by multidisciplinary therapies combined with irradiation and chemotherapy. A 77-year-old female underwent an upper gastrointestinal series at another hospital, because she began to develop a dysphagia, postprandial nausea and vomiting. She was referred to the hospital with a diagnosis of cancer of the esophagus extending to the ImEiEa. Fiberscopic biopsy revealed undifferentiated small cell carcinoma of the esophagus. A veriety of examiantions showed that it was a non-resectable cancer of the esophagus, which invaded the left atrium, aorta, left bronchus, and left pleura. She received 37.5 Gy of rediotherapy in total, irradiating to the thoracic esophagus and mediastinum, and chemotherapy consisting in total of CDDP 50mg and 5-FU 10, 000mg. This multidisciplinary therapy caused disappearance of the tumor shadow and fistula formation to the mediastinum on an esophagogram. She died of pneumonia. Small cell carcinomas of the esophagus that tend to metastasize extensively in an early stage at the diagnosis are mostly non-resectable, but we think that aggressive multidisciplinary therapy should be tried for this disease, because there many case reports which were successfully treated by recent effective chemotherapy.
