A CASE OF ASYMPTOMATIC ISLET CELL TUMOR PRESENTED INTERESTING IMAGES

Abstract

A 41-year-old man complained of right lower abdominal pain and fever up was diagnosed as having diverticulitis of the colon, and admitted to the hospital. Accidentally a tumor of the pancreas tail was pointed out by enhanced CT scan of the abdomen. CT showed no cystic lesion, calcification, or enhancement in the tumor. Angiography showed a hypovascular tumor compressed the splenic vein, but no tumor stain. We performed distal pancreatectomy and splenectomy under a diagnosis of a solid-pseudopapillary tumor. Histopathologically the tumor was similar in structure to islet cell, and immunologically the tumor cells were positive for chromogranin A. We finally diagnosed this case as asymptomatic islet cell tumor.
Since some non-functioning endocrine tumors of the pancreas can show untypical images such as hypovascular one, islet cell tumor must be kept in mind in diagnosing pancreatic tumors.