Pancreas cancer with Whipple’s operation

Whipples disease: a review

Whipple’s disease was described in 1907 and given the name “intestinal lipodystrophy” until it was found that the agent responsible is a bacterium named Tropheryma whipplei. It’s a rare disease which occurs predominantly in males aged 30-60. The small intestinal mucosa is always affected with lesions that are specific to this disease. Replacement of most of cellular elements in the lamina propr...

Cancer of the pancreas: palliative operation, Whipple procedure, or total pancreatectomy.

The choice of operation for ductal carcinoma of the pancreas is as yet not clear. Failure to make an early diagnosis still stands out as the major problem in the treatment of this disease and as a result the resectability rate is exceedingly low. Between 1964 and 1973, nineteen total pancreatectomies were performed at Peter Bent Brigham Hospital for all tumors of the pancreas. Sixteen of these ...

Exocrine pancreas cancer

The pancreas cancer microenvironment.

Pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDA) is a common and lethal malignancy resulting in more than 250,000 deaths per year worldwide. Despite extensive efforts, cytotoxic and targeted therapies have provided only limited efficacy for patients with PDA to date. One contributing factor to the failure of systemic therapies may be the abundant tumor stromal content that is the characteristic of PDA. T...

Cancer of the pancreas.

The malignant growth may originate either in the duct cells or acini of the gland, or in the islets of Langerhans. Cancer of the islet cells is uncommon and is discussed in a later section. About 80% of tumours are adenocarcinomas which arise from ductular epithelium. The neoplasm is hard and scirrhous and the cells are columnar or cuboidal with clear-cut cellular outlines. Cancers arising from...