Head and neck cancer (HNC) is among the common cancer in Malaysia. Depending on the location of the cancer in head and neck region, each type of HNC has its own characteristics and prevalence to specific gender and ethnicity. The remote and inaccessible location of the cancer also cause the difficulty to detect the cancer. This make the cancer usually diagnosed at late stage and make the treatment very challenges and ended with low survival rate of post-treatment among HNC patients. In fact, the detection of HNC at early stage could promise high successful recovery rate. This situation demand lots of studies to explore the carcinogenesis of HNC and searching for robust diagnostic, prognostic and therapeutic biomarkers. MicroRNA (miRNA) is a class of non-coding RNA that regulate cellular physiology at post-transcriptional level. miRNAs expression has
been found to deregulate in various disease state, including cancer. A few studies revealed that miRNAs can behave as oncogenic and tumour suppressor in HNC. Even HNC is common in Malaysia, the studies of miRNA in HNC are still scarce. In this review article, we highlight the studies of miRNA in HNC that have been published by Malaysian researchers with aim to call more Malaysian researchers to focus on miRNA researches in HNC.
Primary cutaneous anaplastic large cell lymphoma (PC-ALCL) is relatively a rare tumour of head and
neck region. Without histopathological confirmation, it appears and behaved as like malignant epithelial tumor of
the head and neck region as will be illustrated in the present case. Cutaneous involvement of the tumor with
distant metastasis has made the prognosis unfavorable. This isolated case of head and neck PC-ALCL was
highlighted as it has a tendency to behave aggressively and early diagnosis and treatment is crucial to avoid poor
survival outcome.
Objective: This study aimed to determine the association of socio-demographic factors and quality of life (QOL) of HNC survivors before and after treatment in Malaysia. Methods: 40 HNC patients were recruited, and assessed for their with QOL with Life Cancer Survivor (QLQ-CS) Head & Neck 35 (QLQ-H&N35) questionnaire pre-treatment and six months post-treatment. One way analysis of variance (ANOVA) and paired t-test were done to analyse the data. Results: The result shows that the QOL of HNC patients were at medium level (total mean score M= 6.22) before treatment, and reduced (total mean score M= 4.84) at 6 months after treatment) . Only health history was seen significantly associated with QOL of HNC patients, both pre and post-treatment. Post treatment showed only marital status factor associated with QOL of HNC patients. The paired sample t-test result shows that the symptoms /problem pre- treatment (M = 255.10, SD = 20.405 )was lower than post treatment (M = 201.80, SD = 22.025)(t (49) = 9.337; p =0.001). Conclusions: The present research suggested that the patients’ QOL is reduced after treatment (medium level). This could be due to the advancement of the cancer and evidence when the health history and symptoms found significantly associated with the QOL. Thus, socio-demographic factors is very crucial factors that must be considered during patients’ assessment in improving patients’ care and optimum QOL pre and post treatment.
The aim of this study was to investigate the level of miR-744 expression in nasopharyngeal carcinoma (NPC) tumour tissue and to provide initial clue on its potential as biomarkers for early detection of NPC in a preliminary analysis. Total miRNAs was extracted from NPC tissue as well as normal nasopharynx tissue taken from Hospital Tengku Ampuan Afzan (HTAA), Kuantan and converted into cDNA. The level of miR-744 expression in the cDNA was quantified using quantitative reverse transcription polymserase chain reaction (RT-qPCR) technique. The expression level of SNORD48 was measured simultaneously for each sample, which served as endogenous control. The difference in the expression of miR-744 in NPC and normal nasopharynx tissue were analysed using relative quantification, 2-ΔΔCT. In this preliminary analysis, this study found that miR-744 was upregulated in NPC as compared to normal nasopharynx tissue by 2.5 fold changes, respectively suggesting it may involve in progression of tumour. However, the finding is not significant and may not accurately reflect the overall population, due to small sample size involved in the study. Findings from the current study suggest the potential of miR-744 to serve as useful diagnostic and prognostic biomarker in NPC.
Primary thyroid lymphoma is a relatively uncommon pathology of the thyroid gland that mainly occurs in elderly females. We describe a rare case of B-cell thyroid lymphoma in a young healthy male. It is an important diagnosis to be considered in patients presenting with a rapidly enlarging neck mass as its management is different from other differentiated thyroid carcinoma which require total thyroidectomy plus adjuvant radioactive iodine ablation. Our report emphasizes the need for clinical awareness leading to early detection, followed by early multidisciplinary management.
The standard management for the majority of benign jaw cysts is enucleation, marsupialisation, curettage and decompression. Enucleation has the advantage that the whole specimen is sent for microscopic evaluation so that more sinister pathological processes (i.e. squamous cell carcinoma) may not be missed. In a large cystic lesion, enucleation is still possible, but technical difficulties might be encountered. In such instances, inevitable damage can occur to the surrounding structures. We report a case of a large radicular cyst of the maxilla that was enucleated via endoscopic assistance through the Caldwell Luc approach.