Metastatic papillary carcinoma of thyroid in a patient undergoing allogeneic BMT for CML

A 30-year-old woman underwent HLA-compatible bone marrow transplant for chronic myeloid leukaemia. Her post-transplant course was complicated by disseminated aspergillus and CMV infections resulting in death 65 d post transplant. At post-mortem, multiple pulmonary metastases of papillary carcinoma of the thyroid were found with a small (< 8 mm) primary carcinoma in the thyroid. It is suggested that the progression of this tumour was related to the patient's immunocompromised state.