Sweet's syndrome with adenocarcinoma of lung: a rare case report

Sweet's syndrome is a rare inflammatory disease of unknown etiology, and its relationship with tumors is unknown at present. Sweet's syndrome in patients with solid tumors, especially adenocarcinoma of the lung, is extremely rare. At present, only 1 case of an operative patient has been reported in the literature. Diagnosing lung cancer with Sweet's syndrome is not easy, when there is a fever with an unknown cause and erythemas, especially when the erythemas do not disappear after antibiotic treatment, a skin biopsy is much important. Although the exact mechanism of the disease and its link to lung cancer are unknown, our case shows that the active surgical treatment of the primary disease and appropriate glucocorticoid therapy are effective means.

We report the first case of a patient with Sweet's syndrome and lung adenocarcinoma with a decrease in peripheral whole blood cells. A 66-year-old male patient presented, who had been suffering from a fever for >10 days and had multiple tender erythemas, erythemas were mainly on the limbs and upper chest. He was treated with a variety of antibiotics, but his symptoms did not improve significantly. The routine blood tests results show a decline in peripheral blood cells, a chest computed tomography (CT) examination showed a space occupying lesion in the middle lobe of the right lung, which was considered peripheral lung cancer. Sweet's syndrome was diagnosed after a skin biopsy, a pathological examination showed that a large number of neutrophils were infiltrating. The patient then underwent video-assisted thoracoscopic lobectomy associated with the systematic dissection of the mediastinal lymph node, and glucocorticoids were administered. After the operation, the tender erythemas and fever disappeared, at the 1-month follow-up, the chest CT showed no obvious tumor recurrence or metastasis.

To the best of our knowledge, this is the first report of Sweet's syndrome in a patient with lung adenocarcinoma with 3 cell lines reduced. The active surgical treatment of the primary disease and appropriate glucocorticoid therapy proved to be an effective treatment for this syndrome.