[Unusual course of metastatic cancer of the uterine cervix]

The following report describes the case history of a 40-year-old woman suffering from a squamous carcinoma of the cervix uteri stage IV with predominantly cutaneous metastases. After a combined treatment of local radiotherapy and polychemotherapy with cisplatinum, bleomycin and methotrexate, a complete remission of the disease has been achieved. Six months later, however, a local recurrence of the tumor in the cervix uteri was diagnosed. As the patient showed no evidence of metastases, a radical hysterectomy was then performed. While the chemotherapy was continued over longer time intervals, the patient lived for a further five months in good health and without any recurrence of the disease. More than one year after treatment was started, the patient died suddenly of uncontrollable cerebral metastases. Considering the unfavourable prognosis and the satisfactory quality of the patient's life after therapy, the course of treatment undertaken appears to have been justifiable.