Mets Flashcards
List six behavioural characteristics of malignant cancer cells.
Loss of contact inhibition. Decreased cell-to-cell adhesions. Increased motility. Immortality. Produce specific tumor antigens. Produce cancer degrading enzymes. Produce ectopic hormones. Metastasize.
Describe the haematological spread of metastatic cancer cells.
To metastasize to an unrelated distant site a cell must 1. Break loose from primary tumour. 2. Secrete enzymes (breakdown matrix) to invade surrounding tissue. 3. Gain access to a blood vessel 4. Survive its passage in the blood stream by avoiding host immune response by combining with blood components. 5. Emerge from the blood stream at a favourable location by express specific surface attachment factors to recognize and attach to specific secondary site. 6. Grow at secondary site by triggering growth of cell and stimulate new blood vessels to grow.
Name and describe the distinctive radiographic features of metastatic bone disease from this type of cancer.
OSTEOBLASTIC (15%). Easier to identify though their margins are usually ill defined. Diffuse scattered pattern resembling “snowballs”.
Name and describe the distinctive pathological features of metastatic bone disease from this type of cancer.
OSTEOBLASTIC (15%) Increased density is due to lying down of new bone by osteoblasts. it is non-neoplastic in nature. it is a reactive response of the local osteoid tissue to the tumour
