Endoscopic ultrasound of solid pancreatic lesions: our clinical experience

Ductal adenocarcinomas account for 85-90% of pancreatic tumors. In 60-70% of cases, the tumor is localized to the head, 5-10% to the body, and 10-15% to the tail. One-year survival of patients with pancreatic cancer is 26%, while 5-year survival is 6%. Endoscopic ultrasound is very sensitive in detecting solid pancreatic lesions.AIM: Introducing the clinicopathological features of our patients with pancreatic tumorsMETHOD: This study included 38 patients [15 females (39.5%) and 23 males (60.5%), with a mean age of 65.10 ± 10.21 years, range 34-78, with solid pancreatic lesions, who were announced in the period January 2018 - July 2019. Endoscopic Ultrasound (EUS) was performed with Pentax EG- 3870UTK Endoscopic Ultrasound. The EUS FNA is made with 22 gauge needles.RESULTS: We had two groups, the group with adenocarcinomas [n = 36 (94.7%)], and the second group with two patients with insulinoma. The main symptom was pain (57.9%). 36.8% of them were with jaundice. Nearly half of these patients were examined with EUS (17 patients). 21% of them used tobacco. Regarding the localization of the solid lesion in 25 patients (65.8%) it was in the head of the pancreas, 8 (21%) in the body and two of them were in the tail and the uncin. Most of the patients were stage IV.CONCLUSIONS: The description of the characteristics of our patients with solid pancreatic tumors is similar to the literature. Most of the patients were in stage IV. Material for histopathological analysis can be obtained with linear EUS. All of these features make EUS the method of choice for patients with pancreatic disease.