Liver metastases with unknown primary focus in the first application: evaluation of 52 cases
Faruk Elyiğit1, Mustafa Değirmenci1, Harun Akar1, Hakan Yarkıcı1, Gülden Diniz2
1İzmir Tepecik Eğitim ve Araştırma Hastanesi, İç Hastalıkları Kliniği, İzmir, Türkiye
2İzmir Tepecik Eğitim ve Araştırma Hastanesi, Patoloji Kliniği, İzmir, Türkiye
Keywords: Biopsy; liver metastases; primary focus.
Abstract
Objectives:This study aims to evaluate the patients with liver metastases of unknown origin followed up at the internal medicine clinic of our hospital.
Patients and methods: The files of 52 patients (35 males, 17 females, mean age 62.8 years; range 29 to 87 years), followed up at the internal medicine clinic of our hospital between January 2009 and December 2015, diagnosed with metastatic liver tumors by biopsy were reviewed retrospectively. Patients were evaluated regarding their age, sex, the cause of admission, laboratory tests, histopathologic diagnosis and primary focus.
Results: We found the following in the histopathological examination of the metastatic tumors; adenocarcinoma in 35 (66%), neuroendocrine tumors in nine (17%) and other tumor metastases in nine (17%) patients. The primary focus was found in 31 patients (59.6%) and colorectal was determined to be the primary focus in eight (15.3%), lung in eight (15.3%), pancreas in seven (13.4%), cholangiocellular in four (7.6%) and other organs in three (5.7%) patients.
Conclusion: In our study, the incidence of neuroendocrine tumors and the incidence of patients whose primary focus was determined were high in patients admitted with metastatic liver tumor of unknown primary focus. We suggest that biopsy should be performed in patients of metastatic liver tumors.