A case report of gemcitabine treatment for duodenal cancer: the good (a sustained response) and the bad (life threatening refractory thrombotic thrombocytopenic purpura).

BACKGROUND

Adenocarcinoma of the duodenum is a rare cancer and not submitted to the type of clinical trials that guide chemotherapy treatments in other gastrointestinal malignancies.

METHODS

This case demonstrates the potential use for gemcitabine, a chemotherapy typically used in pancreas and biliary tract tumors, in this difficult to treat disease as this patient had a partial response to single agent gemcitabine. Unfortunately, this case also demonstrates one of the rare potential adverse reactions to gemcitabine, which is the development of thrombotic thrombocytopenic purpura (TTP).

CONCLUSIONS

In this case, the TTP was extremely difficult to treat but was resolved with splenectomy.