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Nasopharyngeal Carcinoma Case Study

Decent Essays

Nasopharyngeal carcinoma (NPC) is a rare disease in the Western world, with an incidence in the United States of 0.5–2 per 100,000. However, the incidence of NPC is significantly higher in southern China, southeast Asia, and the Middle East/North Africa, where it is one of the most common cancers [1].With the highest prevalence in Southern China where an average of 80 cases per100,000 populations is reported each year [2]. This geographic variation suggests interactions of different factors such as Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) infection [3] genetic predisposition, and environmental factors including diet [4,5], which are more likely to be found in combination in endemic regions. However, an increased incidence of NPC in younger individuals in endemic …show more content…

NPC cells express EBV latent proteins, such as EBNA-1, LMP-1, and LMP-2, as well as BamHI, a fragment of the EBV genome [6]. It is thought that viral proteins may induce epithelial cellular growth following exposure to EBV, with secondary genetic alterations occurring with exposure to environmental carcinogens later in life [7]. However the early diagnosis of nasopharyngeal carcinoma can be a difficult task because the post nasal space is relatively inaccessible to examination 4,5 compounded by the fact that the presentation of nasopharyngeal carcinoma is variable ( patients may present with headache, cranial nerve involvement, nasal obstruction, or a neck mass due to nodal metastases), however, patients may remain asymptomatic for a long time, given the often clinically occult site of presentation [8] and patients consult doctors of different specialties who have little experience in managing nasopharyngeal carcinoma [6]. It is, therefore, not surprising that the diagnosis of nasopharyngeal carcinoma is delayed [9-11]. It is of concern that only 10% of patients are diagnosed early at stage I [12]. Early-stage NPC is curable with RT alone, with

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