Cystadenocarcinoma of the pancreas manifested as a splenic cyst

The case of a 69-year-old man with a multicystic splenic tumor was reported. The tumor occupied about half of the spleen. It was composed of multiple cysts and histologically confirmed as a cystadenocarcinoma. Invasion was observed in the splenic flexure of the colon. A small portion of the pancreatic tail was also involved in the tumor. As to the histogenesis of this "splenic cystic tumor", two possible viewpoints, that is, a growth as a secondary metastasis of a cystadenocarcinoma of the pancreatic tail, and a development on the basis of an aberrant pancreatic tissue in the spleen, were proposed. Regardless of its histogenetical aspects, such a splenic lesion as the present case seems to occur extremely rarely, and only one instance similar to our case could be found in the literature.