[An autopsy case of adult neuroblastoma]

The patient was a 31-year-old man with neuroblastoma of the right adrenal gland, which presented at first as metastatic spinal epidural tumor. Catecholamine and its products in the blood and urine and neuron-specific enolase in the blood were increased. Six months after right adrenectomy followed by chemotherapy, the patient died due to cachexia. Autopsy revealed widespread metastasis. By electron microscopy, the centers of the Homer-Wright rosettes were occupied by neuropil-like structures consisting of a number of cytoplasmic processes of tumor cells, but no cored vesicles were found either in the processes or perikaryons of the tumor cells.