Agm. Vanoosterhout et al., THE ROLE OF HISTOPATHOLOGIC SUBTYPING IN PREDICTING NEUROLOGIC COMPLICATIONS IN SMALL-CELL LUNG-CANCER, International journal of oncology, 4(1), 1994, pp. 201-205
We examined the significance of histologic subtyping of small cell lun
g cancer (SCLC) as a prognostic factor for neurologic complications an
d in particular central nervous system (CNS) metastases. Pretreatment
material of 239 consecutive patients with SCLC was retrospectively ree
xamined according to the histologic subclassification of the Pathology
Panel of the International Association for the Study of Lung Cancer.
Besides the classic small cell type (n=178), this subclassification di
stinguishes two variant cell types: mixed (n=31) and combined (n=1), w
hich were treated as one group in the further statistical analysis. Tw
enty nine cases were not classified, for the following reasons: autops
y material only (n=14), slides missing (n=7), and initial SCLC diagnos
is changed (n=8). The results showed that neurologic complications reg
istered in a prospective neurologic follow-up were common in both subt
ypes and predominantly metastatic in nature. The data did not reveal a
ny significant difference between histologic subtypes with regard to C
NS metastases and brain metastatic-free survival. Paraneoplastic syndr
omes tended to occur more frequently in patients with classic small ce
ll type. However, this relationship needs further study. It was conclu
ded that no prognostic relevance exists for histologic subtyping with
respect to neurologic complications.