Otalgia and Facial Nerve Palsy: Common Symptoms Revealing the Uncommon Pathology of Middle Ear Lymphoma.

Lymphoma of the middle ear and mastoid is uncommon and is rarely diagnosed early. The clinical presentation occurs due to consequences of extensive progressive disease. It can manifest as benign middle ear pathologies such as otitis media; other presentations include facial nerve palsy, hearing loss, and vestibular dysfunction. We treated a case of a 38-year-old male who presented with extranodal involvement of diffuse large B-cell lymphoma (DLBCL) of the middle ear, mastoid, and temporalis muscle, which mimicked an acute otitis media complicated with facial nerve palsy and hearing loss. He has underlying mediastinal and cervical DLBCL diagnosed 20 months before the current presentation. He underwent cortical mastoidectomy and chemotherapy. Despite treatment, he succumbed to the disease. We discuss the clinical significance of middle ear lymphoma by reviewing similar cases in the literature. To conclude, refractory middle ear disease should alert the surgeon of a more sinister underlying pathology in a patient with malignancy.

Collision tumor of the ovary: Fibroma and mature cystic teratoma.

Collision tumor consists of two tumors occurring in the same organ without intermixture of the two cell types. The most common type of collision tumor in ovary is between teratoma and surface epithelial tumor. A 38-year-old woman presented with complained of lower abdominal pain and tightness, and a solid partially cystic left ovarian mass with minimal ascites was detected. Left salpingo-oophorectomy was performed. The ovarian mass measured 15 × 12 × 7 cm with a pedunculated mass on its surface which measured 6 × 2.5 × 2.5 cm. Histologically, it was a collision tumor of fibroma and mature cystic teratoma. Fibroma becomes more edematous as their size increases, which is frequently accompanied by the escape of increasing quantities of fluid from the tumor surfaces. Ascites is often detected when the fibroma is more than a diameter of 10 cm. It is important to identify the different components of a collision tumor for proper management.

Endocan expression in placenta of women with hypertension.

AIM: The aim of our study was to determine the endocan-1 expression in placenta of hypertensive women, and its association with maternal and fetal outcomes. METHODS: This was a cross-sectional study consisted of 21 pregnant women with hypertension and 23 without hypertension. The gestational age ranged from 28 to 39 weeks (hypertensive) and 32 to 40 weeks (normotensive). The paraffin embedded formalin fixed placenta tissue blocks were retrieved from the pathology archives. Endocan immunohistochemistry was performed on tissue sections of full thickness and maternal surface of the placenta. The endocan expression was determined in fetal endothelial cells, maternal endothelial cells, cytotrophoblasts, syncytiotrophoblasts and decidual cells. The differences in endocan expression in placenta between hypertensive and normotensive subjects were evaluated by Pearson chi-square test and t-test were used in the statistical analysis. RESULTS: The endocan expression was significantly higher in fetal endothelial cells (P < 0.001), maternal endothelial cells (P = 0.003) and decidual cells (P < 0.001) in the placenta of women with hypertension. When comparing positive and negative endocan expression in maternal outcomes, endocan was associated with the development of pre-eclampsia (P = 0.03). Also, a positive endocan expression was associated with low birthweight (P = 0.001) and prematurity (P = 0.005) in the fetal outcomes. CONCLUSION: This study showed endocan is highly expressed in fetal endothelial cells, maternal endothelial cells and decidual cells in placenta of hypertensive women. In addition, its expression was associated with poorer maternal and fetal outcomes. These findings suggest endocan may play an important role in the progression of hypertension in pregnancy.