Secondary ameloblastic carcinoma of the jaw: a case report

Odontogenic carcinomas are rare tumors mainly classified as malignant ameloblastoma, ameloblastic carcinoma, or primary intraosseous carcinoma. The former two terms have been long used as synonyms in literature. The term ameloblastic carcinoma is used to describe those ameloblastomas in which there is histological evidence of malignancy and overall histological pattern of ameloblastoma. The maxilla is an unusual location for these tumors. Less than 70 cases have been reported in literature. This is a report on a 50 years old female patient with a recurrent ameloblastoma of the right maxillo-mandibular region. The tumor was initially diagnosed as ameloblastoma based on small excisional biopsies. The biopsies concerned a small part of the tumor, probably in the component exhibiting classic ameloblastoma precursor. Complete tumor resection revealed areas of cytological atypia, necrosis and invasion to surrounding bone and soft tissue in a background of ameloblastoma. These features justified the final diagnosis as "secondary ameloblastic carcinoma

Histopathological pattern of thyroid lesions in western region of Saudi Arabia

Partial or complete thyroidectomies are frequently encountered by the practicing pathologist and the possibility of neoplastic disease is of major concern in patients with thyroid nodules. Pathological evaluation of those specimens ranged from non-neoplasticlesion to highly aggressive malignancy. This study aimed to document the frequency of different patterns of thyroid diseases as presented to pathology departments at King Abdul-Aziz University Hospital [KAUH] and King Faisal Specialty Hospital and Research centre [KFSHRC] within the last twelve years. All specimens presented to pathology departments at KAUH [1997-2008] and KFSHRC [2000-2008] as thyroidectomies [partial or complete] were retrospectively reviewed and categorized according to their histological appearance. The total number of the studied cases was 845 cases. The age of the patients ranged between 9 and 93 years. One hundred seventy eight were males and 667 were female [male to female ratio; 1:3.7]. The reviewed cases were classically categorized into two main groups; Non-neoplastic [494; 58.5%] and Neoplastic [351; 41.5%]. The non-neoplastic group includes: Multinodular Goiter [311 cases; 36.8%], hashimoto/chronic lymphocytic thyroiditis [64 cases; 7.6%], single hyperplastic nodule [51 cases; 6%], Grave's disease [8 cases; 0.9%], miscellaneous [58 cases; 6.9%]. The neoplastic group includes benign category represented by "Adenomas" and includes 94 cases [11% of all cases, and 26.8% of neoplastic cases] and the malignant category includes 256 cases, representing 30.3% of all studied cases and 73% of the neoplastic category. Two hundred and nine cases [81.6% of malignant] were papillary carcinoma. Thyroid lesions are more common in Saudi female. The majority of the thyroid nodules in Saudi are non-neoplastic. Papillary carcinoma is the commonest type of thyroid cancer in Saudi society. Thyroid neoplasm is rare in Saudi children