Synchronous squamous cell carcinoma of the endometrium and endometrioid adenocarcinoma of the ovary

Background: Synchronous primary endometrial and ovarian cancers are relatively uncommon in general population. The etiology and pathogenesis of this phenomenon remains unclear. Our aim is to present a case of synchronous squamous cell carcinoma of the endometrium and endometrioid adenocarcinoma of the ovary and review current literature. Case: The patient, a 64-year old, nulliparous postmenopausal Greek woman presented with a complaint of abdominal pain and abnormal uterine bleeding. Preoperative Computer Tomography (CT) of the abdomen and pelvis, and abdominal Ultrasound (U/S) revealed an intra-abdominal mass 3 cm with solid components between left ovary and small bowel. She underwent total abdominal hysterectomy with bilateral salpingo-oophorectomy, total omentectomy, pelvic and para-aortic lymph node dissection and removal of the implant at the serosa of small bowel. The histopathology revealed stage Ia endometrial cancer squamous type and stage IIIc ovarian cancer endometrioid type. Postoperative she underwent to adjuvant chemotherapy and radiotherapy. Follow up 22 months after initial surgery, revealed no evidence of recurrence. Conclusion: The reason for better median overall survival of patients with synchronous primary endometrial and ovarian cancers is not intuitively obvious. Perhaps favourable clinical outcome may be related with the detection of patients at early stage and low grade disease with an indolent growth rate.