[Clinical study of nineteen thymic carcinomas]

Nineteen cases of thymic carcinoma treated in our hospital (mean age 60.0 years, seven males and twelve females) were studied clinically. Thirteen cases (68.4%) had subjective symptom; for example, chest pain, face edema or cough. Two cases (10.5%) had the associated diseases; one had gammaglobulinemia, the other one had Cushing syndrome and hypogammaglobulinemia. The histological subtypes were eleven squamous cell carcinomas (SCC) (57.9%), three undifferentiated carcinomas, two small cell carcinomas, one papillary adenocarcinoma and one lymphoepithelioma-like carcinoma. The 5 year survival rate of all cases was 42.7%. The 10 years survival rate was 21.4%. The median survival time was 56.1 months. There were one Stage I case, nine stage III cases, four stage IVa cases and five stage IVb cases. More than stage III cases were eighteen (94.7%). Five cases of stage IVb were T2N1M0, T3N1M0, T3N0M1 and T4N0M1. The 5 year survival rate of SCC was 65.6%, and that of the other subtypes was 14.3%. The cases resected completely were only eight cases (42.1%), and the 5 year survival rate of these was 70.0%. On the other hand, the rate of five cases resected incompletely was 53.3%. Metastasis occurred in 12 cases (63.2%). Metastasis occurred frequently in pleura, lymphnode, lung, bone and liver. The radiotherapy for SCC was effective and the 5 year survival rate was 83.3%. Furthermore, there were some long survivors in the cases undergone incomplete resections by postoperative radiotherapy jointly. On the other hand, the chemotherapy was not effective in our series. However, it was reported recently that the regimen including cisplatin was effective. So it was impressed that the combined therapy including surgery radiotherapy and induction chemotherapy would be important to obtain better results.