Serum calcitonin negative medullary thyroid carcinoma.
BACKGROUND
Medullary thyroid carcinomas (MTC) constitute about 5 to 7% of thyroid neoplasms. They originate from parafollicular C cells which produce Calcitonin, a hormone which has an impact on calcium metabolism and represents the biochemical activity of MTC. In rare cases pre-operative serum calcitonin can be negative.


METHODS
We report on a 73-year-old female patient with a rare case of a serum calcitonin negative medullary thyroid carcinoma who suffered fulminant post-operative course and died of multiple metastasis.


CONCLUSIONS
This case shows that in very rare cases MTCs do not secrete calcitonin making diagnosis and tumour follow-up difficult. To this date, only few reports describing this combination of circumstances were found in the English literature.
Sand
Michael
M
Department of General and Visceral Surgery, Augusta Krankenanstalt, Academic Teaching Hospital, Ruhr-University Bochum, Germany. michael.sand@ruhr-uni-bochum.de
Gelos
Marcos
M
Sand
Daniel
D
Bechara
Falk G
FG
Bonhag
Gerd
G
Welsing
Ellen
E
Mann
Benno
B