Small cell carcinoma of the cervix is a rare cancer, comprising less than 3% of all cervical neoplasms. It uniformly has a poor prognosis, and has a high mortality even with early stage disease. It can metastasise rapidly and metastatic sites include lung, liver, brain, bone, pancreas and lymph nodes. The largest retrospective review was form Korea and published in 2007. It concluded that : "results indicate primary radical surgery followed by adjuvant chemotherapy is the preferred treatment modality for patients with early stage SCNEC disease." Although this study was retrospective in design, with a limited number of patients, it is one of the largest series reported to date. Favorable results have been reported for patients with SCNCC who received concurrent chemoradiation followed by several additional cycles of chemotherapy, while other studies have reported that radical surgery is an important component in the multimodal treatment of SCNCC.
Lee JM, Lee KB, Nam JH, Ryu SY, Bae DS, Park JT, Kim SC, Cha SD, Kim KR, Song SY, Kang SB : Prognostic factors in FIGO stage IB-IIA small cell neuroendocrine carcinoma of the uterine cervix treated surgically: results of a multi-center retrospective Korean study.Ann Oncol 19(2): 321-326, 2008
G. BIFULCO, V. D. MANDATO, P. GIAMPAOLINO, R. PICCOLI, L. INSABATO, N. DE ROSA, and C. NAPPI
Small Cell Neuroendocrine Cervical Carcinoma with 1-Year Follow-up: Case Report and Review
Anticancer Res, February 1, 2009; 29(2): 477 - 484.
Cervical cancer begins in cells on the surface of the cervix. Over time, the cervical cancer can invade more deeply into the cervix and nearby tissues. The cancer cells can spread by breaking away from the original (primary) tumor. They enter blood vessels or lymph vessels, which branch into all the tissues of the body.
Posted by: symptoms of cervical cancer | May 12, 2011 at 07:20 AM