[Small intestinal stromal tumors with skenoid fibers. Clinicopathological study of three cases]

Gastrointestinal stromal tumours (Gist) are mesenchymal tumour with uncertain prognosis occurring in the gastrointestinal tract wall. For clinicians, these tumours raise two problems: to establish the diagnosis and to determinate the future behaviour for the choice officient therapeutics. For the diagnosis the new marker c-KIT is useful. A new treatment with an inhibitor of c-KIT has given encouraging results. currently there is no consensus on specific cut-points to distinguish as low or high risk (i.e., malignant) Gist. For metastases-free Gist, the prominent histopronostic markers are size, mitotic index and localization of the tumour. The small intestine Gist have the reputation to be more aggressive than in other localization. Skenoid fibers in small intestine Gist could be a marker of good prognostic. The authors reported three cases of small intestine Gist with skenoid fibers. The discussion point out the significance of this particular morphological aspect.