Lymph nodes metastasis is a risk factor for bone metastasis from extrahepatic cholangiocarcinoma

The rate and site of bone metastasis from cholangiocarcinoma as well as the prognosis are unclear. Therefore, we intend to make a comparative review of the background to bone metastasis, examine a high-risk group for bone metastasis and use the data towards the improvement in quality of life.

We studied 200 cases of cholangiocarcinoma resected in our division from January 2003 to April 2010.

Bone metastasis was confirmed in four cases (2.0%). The survival period after the diagnosis of bone metastasis ranged from 2.9 months to 21.6 months and the average was 6.7 months. We studied histopathological findings of bone metastasis, lymph node metastasis, lymphatic invasion, blood vessel invasion and perineural invasion (ly, v and pn) and found that all of four bone metastasis cases were positive for lymph node metastasis which was a statistically significant factor affecting bone metastasis.

Since the number of cases we studied is small, it is difficult to determine whether lymph node metastasis is a risk factor for bone metastasis; however, we think it is necessary to take the probability of bone metastasis into consideration when we provide medical care to patients positive for lymph node metastasis.