Intramedullary spinal cord metastasis from laryngeal carcinoma: case report and review of literature

Abstract

Laryngeal cancer metastases are relatively rare and mainly affect the lung. The medullary localization remains exceptional. We report the case of a patient followed for operated laryngeal cancer and whose oncologic control revealed a medullary localization. A patient followed for squamous cell carcinoma of the larynx, treated in 2010 by a partial surgery whose endoscopic control at 5 years revealed the presence of right arytenoid edema without suspicious lesions, multiple biopsies were made and which returned negative. A month later, the patient presented a rebel cervical spine pain and a feeling of heaviness of the upper limbs, for which a radiological assessment was done finally objectifying a right hypopharyngeal process and a suspicious right internal jugular lymphadenopathy (biopsy confirmed the squamous type), as well as an intramedullary metastasis. This case is an illustration of an exceptional evolution of this type of cancer and a are metastatic localization difficult to highlight, which leads us to ask the question on the need of simultaneous and systematic radiological and endoscopic control treatment for operated laryngeal cancer.

Keywords

• larynx
• squamous cell carcinoma
• intramedullary spinal cord metastasis