Comparison of serum specific IgE with skin prick test in the diagnosis of allergy in Malaysia.

We compared a newer serum specific IgE (SSIgE) test with skin prick testing (SPT) in the diagnosis of allergy in Malaysia. Ninety newly diagnosed allergic patients were enrolled for both tests. Using SPT as a clinical gold standard, the sensitivity, specificity, positive, and negative predictive values (PPV, NPV) were calculated for SSIgE for each of the common allergens tested. The highest positive results for both SPT and SSIgE were for house dust mite and cat. Compared to SPT, SSIgE showed better sensitivity but poorer specificity, low PPV and good NPV in all the allergens tested. Significant positive correlation was seen between the diameter of wheal and flare of SPT and the SSIgE results.

A child with epistaxis, reduced hearing and cervical lymphadenopathy: a rare case of nasopharyngeal carcinoma in a child.

Although nasopharyngeal carcinoma (NPC) is common in this part of the world, the incidence among children is still very low worldwide. The diagnosis is sometimes delayed because of the late reporting of the symptom by the patient or parents, or difficulty in reaching the final diagnosis due to its hidden anatomical location. The challenges include the difficult endoscopy in children, inability to differentiate an adenoid from the tumour on radiograph and often the inconclusive fine needle aspiration findings. If the tumour mass at Fossa of Rosenmuller can be clearly appreciated and biopsied with undoubtedly proven histology of NPC, the diagnosis can be straight forward and treatment can be commenced as early as possible. We report a 10-year-old child presented with bilateral neck cervical lymphadenopathy and epistaxis with fine needle aspiration cytology (FNAC) of the neck mass reported as lymphoma. Further work-up confirmed he was suffering from NPC.

Head and neck follicular dendritic cell sarcoma: disease associations and treatment review.

Currently, of less than 50 cases of head and neck follicular dendritic cell (FDC) sarcoma reported in the literature, 5 have been found to occur in the background of Castleman disease. We report another case of head and neck FDC sarcoma with emphasise on its associated lesions and review the outcome of treatment from the existing cases in the literature.