[Clinical significance of paraneoplastic syndromes]

The author evaluates the clinical significance of paraneoplastic syndrome. Some clinical syndromes, general or organ syndromes, indicate the possibility of a malignant tumour, however, contemporary technical possibilities in medical diagnostics do not make early diagnosis of tumours possible. In a retrospective evaluation the evidence of a malignant tumour in a group of 396 patients with paraneoplastic syndrome was only 30.4% during the last eight years.