Gastric carcinoma detected by cervical cytology

This paper is a report on a case of gastric carcinoma of diffuse type in a young female patient aged 38. The patient was still asymptomatic at hospita l admission, her only pathological sign being the finding of malignant cell s of indeterminate origin at a routine Pap-test examination. Subsequent inv estigations showed the presence of a poorly differentiated gastric carcinom a, with metastatic diffusion to uterus, ovaries and peritoneum. Only a few cases of gastric carcinomas without cervical localization, detected by Pap- test, are reported in literature, A few other cases with cervical localizat ion have been described. The aim of this work is to point out that a Pap-te st smear may reveal the presence of extragenital tumors still unappreciated . [(C) 2000 Lippincott Williams & Wilkins.].