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Case Reports
. 2025 Aug 21:2025:9910270.
doi: 10.1155/crpu/9910270. eCollection 2025.

Incidentally Detected Pulmonary Carcinoid Tumorlet With Coexisting Carcinoid Tumorlet in the Mediastinal Lymph Node in a Patient With Lung Cancer

Bhavesh Mohan Lal  1 , Michella K Whisman  2 , Matthew A Steliga  3 , Konstantinos Arnaoutakis  1
Affiliations
Case Reports

Incidentally Detected Pulmonary Carcinoid Tumorlet With Coexisting Carcinoid Tumorlet in the Mediastinal Lymph Node in a Patient With Lung Cancer

Bhavesh Mohan Lal et al. Case Rep Pulmonol. .

Abstract

Pulmonary carcinoid tumorlets are a cluster of neuroendocrine cells in the lung, which invade the basement membrane and are less than 5 mm in size. While similar to carcinoid tumors in all regards, they are differentiated from carcinoid tumors purely based on their size. They are generally considered benign, but lymph nodal involvement has been described in the past. It is unclear if lymph nodal involvement is due to metastasis to the lymph node or synchronous de novo proliferation of neuroendocrine cells in the lymph node as well. Here, we describe a patient with adenocarcinoma of the lung who was incidentally detected to have a pulmonary carcinoid tumorlet and a carcinoid tumorlet in the mediastinal lymph node.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no conflicts of interest.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Histopathology and immunohistochemistry of adenocarcinoma of the lung with pulmonary carcinoid tumorlet. (a) Morphology of the invasive adenocarcinoma (H&E, 200x). (b) Pulmonary carcinoid tumorlet (H&E, 200x). (c) Pulmonary carcinoid tumorlet (synaptophysin, 200x). (d) Pulmonary carcinoid tumorlet (TTF-1, 200x). (e) Pulmonary carcinoid tumorlet (Ki-67, 200x).
Figure 2
Figure 2
Carcinoid tumorlet in the mediastinal lymph node. (a) Lymph node carcinoid tumorlet (H&E, 200x). (b) Lymph node carcinoid tumorlet (synaptophysin, 200x). (c) Lymph node carcinoid tumorlet (TTF-1, 200x). (d) Lymph node carcinoid tumorlet (Ki-67, 200x).
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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