Ascending colon adenocarcinoma with tonsillar metastasis: A case report and review of the literature

Abstract

Metastatic palatine tonsil cancer is extremely rare, with nearly 100 such tumors reported in the English literature. The prognosis of metastatic palatine tonsil cancer is poor. A 53-year-old man presented with painless left palatine tonsillar swelling and a cervical mass following right hemicolectomy for an ascending colon adenocarcinoma. Physical examination showed an ulcerated mass located on the upper pole of the left palatine tonsil. A punch biopsy was taken for histological examination which showed a moderatelydifferentiated adenocarcinoma. The patient was treated with palliative radiotherapy and chemotherapy. He was still alive when we wrote this paper. Our case shows that immunohistochemical diagnosis of metastatic palatine tonsil cancer is essential.

Mucoepidermoid Carcinoma of the Palatine Tonsil

“…Malignant lymphoproliferative diseases are the second most frequent malignancy of the palatine tonsil, with the diffuse large B-cell lymphoma (DLBCL) comprising approximately 30% of all lymphomas [ 4 ]. Metastatic deposits of lung [ 5 ] and gastric carcinomas [ 6 ], as well as melanoma [ 7 ], renal carcinoma [ 8 ], and adenocarcinoma of the colon [ 9 ], have also been described in the palatine tonsils.…”

Palatine Tonsillar Metastasis of Small-Cell Neuroendocrine Carcinoma from the Lung Detected by FDG-PET/CT After Tonsillectomy: A Case Report

“…The most common primary sites are the breast (1), stomach (2), intestinal tract (3), cutaneous melanoma (4) and the kidney (5). Various malignant lung carcinomas may metastasize to the tonsils (6, 7) and a few cases of tonsillar metastasis from neuroendocrine lung carcinoma have been reported (6, 7).…”

Canine tonsillar neoplasia and tonsillar metastasis from various primary neoplasms

“…28 In humans, immunohistochemistry stains have been used to confirm whether a melanoma diagnosis is consistent with primary or metastatic disease, especially coupled with the lag time to evidence of metastasis and patient presentation. 31 Specific to human patients with cutaneous melanoma with oropharyngeal metastasis, histopathologic features were able to be utilized to aid in differentiation of primary and metastatic melanoma using junctional changes. 12 In those cases, metastatic melanoma lesions were consistently covered by an intact layer of mucosa in surrounding and/or overlying mucosa and were void of junctional changes.…”