Osseous metastases from carcinomas of the colon and rectum

Abstract

Of 765 patients with disseminated metastatic carcinoma of the colon and rectum treated at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center during the ten-year period 1960--1970, 53 (6.9 per cent) had skeletal metastases. Of these, 14 (1.8 per cent) had osseous metastases only. In one case the osseous lesion was the first symptom of a cancer of the sigmoid colon, and one patient had metastasis in the fibula from a primary rectal cancer. In our series the incidences of osseous metastases were 8.9 per cent from rectal carcinoma and 5.1 per cent from colonic carcinoma. The mean period from manifestation of skeletal metastasis to death was 13.2 months.

The benefit of surgical management of colorectal carcinoma bone metastases

“…Over 36 years, only 41 patients at our institution, out of a total of 35,543 cases of colorectal carcinoma (0.1%), required surgery for skeletal metastases. Our patient numbers and proportions agree with clinical series reported by others [4,5,10,12,13,[15][16][17]22] . Consequently, prognostic factors following surgery for bone metastases are not well understood.…”

“…The disease free interval from primary colorectal diagnosis to the onset of bone metastasis in this study (median of 26 months) is comparable to other reported series [15,16] . The overall incidence of osseous metastases from primary tumors of the gastrointestinal tract has been reported as ranging from 1-10.5 percent [1,18] .…”

“…The incidence of BM from colorectal cancer ranges from 9%-11% in autopsy cases, to 5%-11% in clinical series [4,5,8,[11][12][13][14] . Several studies correlate the site and number of metastasis to other organs with patient survival [5,9,13,[15][16][17] . Skeletal metastases most often occur in the spine [5,16] .…”

Cervical Spine Metastasis as a Primary Manifestation of Occult Colorectal Carcinoma: Case Report

“…Our patient presented with neck pain due to cervical spine metastasis as the primary manifestation of occult colorectal carcinoma, which had not been diagnosed previously. In the series reported by Besbeas and Stearns [5], rectal carcinoma metastasized to bone more frequently than did colonic carcinoma (8.9 and 5.1%, respectively). This difference might relate to differences in anatomical position and venous drainage, because rectal tumors lie adjacent to the paravertebral venous plexus [6,7].…”

Solitary bone metastasis to the tibia from colorectal cancer- A case report

“…Also comparing between various histological types, signet ring cell carcinoma shows a high incidence of bone metastasis. 1,5,6 The most common sites of osseous metastases are the vertebrae, pelvis and sacrum. Osseous metastases in these sites are blood-borne through veins, and the paravertebral venous plexus of Batson.…”