Qianjiang Evening News, Hourly News reporter Wu Chaoxiang, correspondent Wang Yifeng
On February 24, Fang Meiyu, director and chief physician of the Department of Rare Diseases and Head and Neck Medicine of the National Cancer Hospital, and the hospital’s multidisciplinary team were a A 19-year-old German boy had an online teleconsultation.
This high school student is a patient with cardiac sarcoma, a rare disease among tumors that affects less than one in a million.
The chest tightness and shortness of breath, unexpectedly got a rare tumor
The Chinese boy settled in Germany last year Diagnosed with cardiac sarcoma, his parents consulted a paper on cardiac angiosarcoma published in a foreign journal by the Rare Medical Oncology Team of the National University of Science and Technology Cancer Hospital, and then contacted the National University of Science and Technology Cancer Hospital (Zhejiang Cancer Hospital) Fang Meiyu, Director of Head and Neck and Rare Oncology Department.
“His initial symptoms were chest tightness and shortness of breath. After seeking medical treatment, he was found to have pleural effusion and lesions in the lungs. According to our center’s experience, it is likely that the heart angiosarcoma has metastasized to the lungs.” Fang Meiyu introduce.
Li Tao, Chief Physician of Bone and Soft Tissue Surgery, Cancer Hospital Affiliated to the University of Chinese Academy of Sciences (Zhejiang Cancer Hospital), explained that cardiac angiosarcoma is a type of soft tissue sarcoma with a very low incidence, and the number of patients in the country is only a few percent each year. Ten cases, “the number of patients admitted by our hospital is also in single digits every year.”
Generally speaking, cardiac angiosarcoma will grow in the atrium, and some are in the large blood vessels closer to the heart. The emboli formed by a small number of tumor cells fall off into the blood, and enter the lung and brain along with the blood circulation, forming pulmonary embolism or cerebral infarction, which endangers the patient’s life. It mostly occurs in young and middle-aged people, and its pathogenesis is unclear.
Although the incidence rate is low, the degree of malignancy of cardiac angiosarcoma is particularly high. Because the symptoms are not obvious, most patients are diagnosed in the middle and late stages.
“Like this boy, the initial symptoms of many patients are chest tightness, panting when walking, shortness of breath, etc., which are considered to be respiratory diseases or lung problems.” Fang Meiyu said.
In terms of treatment, if detected early, the tumor can be removed by surgical resection. If surgery is not suitable, chemotherapy and targeted therapy can be considered.
In the past year, this German high school student has used chemotherapy to control his condition, but recently, his condition has progressed again, so he consulted Fang Meiyu’s team through remote consultation.
Doctors from UCAS Cancer Hospital are consulting remotely
This type of tumor is more common in Teenagers
Last year, the National University of Science and Technology Cancer Hospital received a woman in her 30s with a heart tumor.
“She was gasping for breath at first and couldn’t climb stairs. She had been treated for pneumonia and diabetes. Finally, through echocardiography, it was found that there was a tumor in the heart, about four or five centimeters in size.” Fang Meiyu said , This patient recurred after surgical resection in another hospital, and the tumor grew to six centimeters in size. “We have tailored a chemotherapy plan for her, and the current condition is stable and maintained relatively well.”
Generally speaking Said that the average survival period of heart tumor patients is about ten months. If detected early, the survival period will be prolonged after early surgical resection.
In addition to cardiovascular tumors, other sarcomas are relatively rare in tumors.
For example, osteosarcoma occurs in adolescents.
Fang Meiyu also treated a seven- or eight-year-old girl some time ago. She fractured her calf while playing a slide and was finally diagnosed with osteosarcoma.
“Some school-age children are prone to fractures when exercising. Further diagnosis will reveal that it is actually osteosarcoma. These are relatively common in clinical practice. As parents, if you find that your child has these signs, You should seek medical treatment as soon as possible.”
“The rare medical oncology department in our hospital has a multidisciplinary team, which integrates radiotherapy, impact, pathology, internal surgery and other departments to diagnose and treat patients, which can improve the accuracy of diagnosis and treatment. “Fang Meiyu said that at present, the research and development of rare tumors is relatively lagging behind. If some domestic patients want to use new drugs, they may need to seek medical treatment overseas. However, the National University of Science and Technology Cancer Hospital has clinical trial projects for related new drugs, as long as these new drugs enter the market. Domestic clinical trials are conducted, and eligible patients may be able to use new drugs for free.