Undifferentiated leukemia following treatment of gastric cancer with 5 fluorouracil, doxorubicin, mitomycin C chemotherapy.

Secondary leukemias are an increasingly well recognized complication of cancer chemotherapy. We report on the development of undifferentiated leukemia in a forty one year lady, eighteen months after treatment of gastric cancer with 5-fluorouracil (5 FU), doxorubicin and mitomycin C. She developed progressive weakness and pancytopenia over a period of few months. Leukemic blasts which were undifferentiated by immunophenotyping were seen in her peripheral blood. She died of intracranial haemorrhage during induction chemotherapy for the leukemia. Undifferentiated leukemia is a rare complication of FAM chemotherapy for gastric cancer.

Asymptomatic carcinoma of the endometrium in a patient on adjunctive tamoxifen therapy for carcinoma of the breast

A case report of a 70 years old female, on tamoxifen for over five (5) years after a left mastectomy and with lymphadenectomy and radiotherapy in whom an asymptomatic adenocarcinoma of the endometrium is reported. Review of the literature suggests this association, however, definitive proof that tamoxifen causes cancer of endometrium has not been fully accepted. The best study in this regards is the one from Radiohemmet Oncologic Centre from Stockholm, Sweden. Patients with cancer of the breast that have been over two (2) years on tamoxifen should be screened with endovaginal sonograms for thickness of endometrium, thickness over 9mm and possibly over 5mm should be investigated with hysteroscopy and fractional uterine curetage