Long-Term Survival due to Chemotherapy including Paclitaxel in a Patient with Metastatic Primary Splenic Angiosarcoma

Figures

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  Fig. 1. Tumor tissue was acquired by biopsy of liver metastases. Microscopic examination showed that atypical cells proliferated and developed into lumen-like or slit-shaped structures with necrosis (a, magnification, ×126 and ×252). Immunohistochemical staining showed that atypical cells were positive for CD31 (b, magnification, ×126) and D2-40 (not shown). Based upon these findings, a diagnosis of angiosarcoma was reached.

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  Fig. 2. An abdominal CE-CT. a, b The arterial phase and the equilibrium phase of CE-CT in the axial plane at the time of transfer to our hospital, respectively. The spleen was enlarged (11 × 7 cm) and mostly replaced by irregularly shaped low-density areas. In both lobes of the liver, there were multiple tumors which were poorly enhanced. c The equilibrium phase of CE-CT after chemotherapy. b Multiple liver metastases became markedly smaller due to treatment with 7 cycles of paclitaxel therapy compared with the size at the time of transfer to our hospital. The best overall response was a partial response (reduction rate of 37%). CE-CT, contrast-enhanced computed tomography.

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  Fig. 3. A pelvic MRI at the time of transfer to our hospital. Multiple nodular abnormal signal areas with low intensity in the T1-weighed image (a) and high intensity in short-T1 inversion recovery images (b) were evident. These findings indicated that there were multiple bone metastases in the sacral and lumbar vertebrae. MRI, magnetic resonance imaging.