Appendiceal carcinoid tumors: a plea for critical reporting

Excerpt

The title of the article by Ranaweera et al. [1] promised much but the content of the paper was disappointing. From a retrospective single institution review between 2000 and 2018, the authors identified 32 children with a histologically confirmed carcinoid tumor of the appendix. The incidence of carcinoid tumor in appendectomy specimens was 0.3%, similar to other large reviews [2, 3]. Twelve children (38%) subsequently underwent ileocolic resection because of “carcinoid size [three tumors were > 2 cm], invasiveness and margin clearance”. Although their analysis may have been skewed by referral patterns, this represents a disturbingly high proportion of children undergoing further surgery for a carcinoid tumor of the appendix. The authors do not provide detailed information about the indications for secondary surgery or indicate whether residual tumor or lymph node metastases were detected in the ileocolic specimens. The authors state that their practice regarding extensive surgery has changed but offer no supporting data. …