Clinical, Laboratory, and Radiological Diagnosis of Pancreatic Islet Cell Tumors
Neuroendocrine tumors include a diverse group of tumors that stem from a lineage of sensory/neural and secretory cells and are predominately located within the bronchopulmonary and gastrointestinal systems. The overall prevalence of neuroendocrine tumors is increasing, likely due to multiple causes, including advances in imaging technology and an aging population. The scope of this chapter will focus on a subset of neuroendocrine tumors of pancreatic origin. Pancreatic endocrine tumors may present sporadically or in association with hereditary genetic mutations, such as multiple endocrine neoplasia syndrome 1. Functional pancreatic endocrine tumors include insulinomas, gastrinomas, glucagonomas, somatostatinomas and VIPomas. Diagnoses of pancreatic endocrine tumors are usually related to clinical manifestation secondary to hypersecretion of hormones and peptides or may be found incidentally on imaging. Localization and staging of neuroendocrine tumors are most precise when clinicians use a mixture of morphological and functional imaging modalities.
