Abstract
Germ cell tumours (GCT) are a relatively common malignancy in men aged 15–35 years. They occur most frequently in the gonads, but 3–5% have extragonadal origin, mainly in the pineal gland, neurohypophysis, mediastinum and retroperitoneum. Although intracranial germinomas may present with synchronous midline lesions, development of metachronous testicular germ cell primaries seems to be extremely rare, and confirmed dissemination of intracranial GCT to the testes has never been reported. We report the case of a 32-year-old man, with previously treated pineal germinoma at age 16 years, who later developed mixed GCT of the left testis.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
References
Schmoll HJ (2002) Extragonadal germ cell tumors. Ann Oncol 13(Suppl 4):265–272
Pottern LM, Goedert JJ (1986) Epidemiology of testicular cancer. In: Javadpour N (ed) Principles and management of testicular cancer, 1st edn. Thieme, New York, pp 107–119
Ueno T, Tanaka YO, Nagata M et al (2004) Spectrum of germ cell tumors: from head to toe. Radiographics 24:387–404
Robertson PL (2005) Intracranial germ cell tumours. In: Schiff D, O’Neill BP (eds) Principles of neuro-oncology, 1st edn. McGraw-Hill, New York, pp 481–498
Chaganti RSK, Houldsworth J (2000) Genetics and biology of adult human male germ cell tumours. Cancer Res 60:1475–1482
Maity A, Shu H, Judkins A et al (2004) Testicular seminoma 16 years after treatment for CNS germinoma. J Neurooncol 70:83–85
Peat DS, Trowell JE (1994) Testicular seminoma in a patient with pineal germinoma. J Clin Pathol 47:771–772
Trentini GP, Maiorana A, De Benedittis A (1985) Metachronous seminoma of the pineal region and right testis—case report. Appl Pathol 3:129–133
Ho CL, Deruytter MJ (2006) Dual occurrence of pineal germinoma and testicular seminoma. Pediatr Neurosurg 42:38–44
Rosenblum MK, Ng HK (2007) Germ cell tumours. In: Louis DN, Ohgaki H, Wiestler OD, Cavenee WK (eds) WHO classification of tumours of the central nervous system, 4th edn. WHO, Lyon, pp 198–204
Packer RJ, Cohen BH, Cooney K (2000) Intracranial germ cell tumours. Oncologist 5:312–320
Wazait HD, Dudderidge T, Allen S et al (2002) Testicular seminoma presenting 22 years after treatment for extra-gonadal germ-cell tumour. Scand J Urol Nephrol 36:387–388
Schneider DT, Schuster AE, Fritsch MK et al (2001) Multipoint imprinting analysis indicates a common precursor cell for gonadal and nongonadal pediatric germ cell tumors. Cancer Res 61:7268–7276
Chaganti RSK, Rodriguez E, Bosl GJ (1993) Cytogenetics of male germ-cell tumors. Urol Clin North Am 20:55–66
Houldsworth J, Reuter V, Bosl GJ, Chaganti RSK (1997) Aberrant expression of cyclin D2 is an early event in human male germ cell tumorigenesis. Cell Growth Differ 8:293–299
Chaganti RSK, Houldsworth J (1998) The cytogenetic theory of the pathogenesis of human adult male germ cell tumors. APMIS 106:80–84
Murty VVVS, Chaganti RSK (1998) A genetic perspective of male germ cell tumors. Semin Oncol 25:133–144
Iwato M, Tachibana O, Tohma Y et al (2000) Alterations of the INK4a/ARF locus in human intracranial germ cell tumors. Cancer Res 60(8):2113–2115
Chaganti RSK, Rodriguez E, Mathew S (1994) Origin of adult male mediastinal germ-cell tumours. Lancet 343:1130–1132
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Silva, V.B., Azevedo, A.L., Costa, I.M. et al. Mixed testicular germ cell tumour in a patient with previous pineal germinoma. J Neurooncol 101, 125–128 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11060-010-0213-x
Received:
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11060-010-0213-x