Friday, January 03, 2025 - A doctor operating on a cancer patient accidentally 'transplanted' the disease into himself.
According to Mail Online, a 32-year-old man
from Germany had been diagnosed with a rare type of cancer and was
having a tumour removed from his abdomen. While in surgery, the doctor
performing the procedure accidentally cut his hand, but the wound was
disinfected and bandaged immediately.
Five months later, the 53-year-old surgeon noticed a small
lump developing where he had injured himself months earlier and sought care.
The lump turned out to be a malignant tumor and tests showed
it was genetically identical to the cancer suffered by his former patient. This
led the medical team who treated him to conclude he had caught the cancer when
tumour cells entered the cut on his hand.
The authors of the case report described the issue as an
unusual situation because in a traditional transplant, the body mounts an
immune response and rejects any foreign tissue, and they would have expected
the same in the doctor's case.
However, given the tumour's development, and growth, it
suggests the surgeon's body had an 'ineffective antitumor immune response.'
The case was originally reported in 1996 but
resurfaced with renewed interest.
Published in The New England Journal of Medicine, doctors
detailed the 'accidental transplantation' of the patient's malignant
fibrous histiocytoma - a rare type of cancer that forms in soft tissue with
just 1,400 diagnoses per year.
The doctor injured the palm of his left hand when trying to
place a drain in his patient while performing surgery to remove the cancer from
the patient's abdomen. The wound was immediately disinfected and bandaged.
The cancer patient's initial surgery was successful, but he
died following complications after the procedure.
Five months later, a hard 1.2-inch 'tumor-like
swelling' appeared at the base of the doctor's left middle finger and he
visited a hand specialist.
An 'extensive' exam was conducted, including numerous
laboratory and blood tests, which revealed no abnormal findings.
The tumour was removed anyway and examining the mass under a
microscope revealed it was also a malignant fibrous histiocytoma.
The physician who had been treating both the cancer patient
and the surgeon 'raised the question of whether the tumours were related.
Samples of both tumours were further analyzed and were
determined to be 'identical.'
They both had the same types of cells and arrangement of
those cells, meaning the surgeon may have unknowingly transferred cancer cells
from the patient to the cut in his hand, allowing the disease to take root and
grow in his body.
The authors wrote: 'Normally, transplantation of allogeneic
tissue from one person to another induces an immune response that leads to the
rejection of the transplanted tissue.
'In the case of the surgeon, an intense inflammatory
reaction developed in the tissue surrounding the tumour, but the tumour mass
increased, suggesting an ineffective antitumor immune response.'
The authors speculate the tumour 'escaped immunologic
destruction through several mechanisms,' including changes to molecules in its
cells and a failure in the surgeon's body to recognize and attack tumor cells
effectively.
Two years after the surgeon had his own tumor removed, there
were no signs the cancer had spread or returned.
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