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Insulin‐Secreting Islet‐Cell Tumours of the Pancreas
Author(s) -
Smith Mervyn
Publication year - 1967
Publication title -
australian and new zealand journal of surgery
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.111
H-Index - 51
eISSN - 1445-2197
pISSN - 0004-8682
DOI - 10.1111/j.1445-2197.1967.tb04005.x
Subject(s) - medicine , islet , tolbutamide , pancreas , insulin , hyperplasia
Some current thoughts on the subject of insulin‐secreting islet‐cell tumours of the pancreas are presented, and a typical case is reported. On the diagnostic side, mention is made of newer aids to diagnosis in the form of tolbutamide and leucine tests and possibly insulin assays. Diagnosis can still be quite confidently made without these aids, and if Whipple's triad is met, surgery is indicated. With regard to surgical treatment, the changing, or changed, distribution picture is presented, and the unlikely occurrence of hyperplasia of islet tissue is mentioned. Management of the case when exploration gives negative results is discussed, emphasis being laid on the possible place for partial pancreaticoduodenectomy rather than blind body‐and‐tail excision. Finally, to indicate that we by no means yet have the answer to the full function of the various components of islet tissue, mention is made of the possible later development of ulcerogenic lesions in a pancreas which has already harboured a beta‐cell tumour.