Pancreatic primary lymphoma: a case report and review of the literature

BACKGROUND: Primary pancreatic lymphoma is a rare but treatable malignancy ( less than 1% of pancreatic tumors) that may be clinically confused with pancreatic adenocarcinoma. METHODS: In a patient with upper abdominal pain, ultra-sonography and CT detected a mass in pancreatic head, which compressed the common bile duct. The patient received a Wliipple’s operation and intraoperative frozen sections of the mass showed an anaplastic carcinoma. Immu-nohistochemical staining was used to indicate the origin and prognosis of tumor. RESULTS: Grossly the tumor involved the pancreatic head, soft in consistence and invaded part of the gastric wall. His-tologically, the tumor was composed mainly of large and moderate neoplastic cells, which were diffusely positive for CD20 and Bcl-6 antigens, indicating the features of diffusely large B cell lymphoma. CONCLUSIONS : The proper diagnosis of the tumor should be made with CD20 and Bcl-6 immunohistochemical study. Radical surgery is indicated for resectable carcinoma but not for a chemosensitive lymphoma.