Gastric linitis adenocarcinoma and carcinomatous meningitis: An infrequent but aggressive association - Report of four cases

Carcinomatous meningitis (CM) is a very rare complication of gastrointestinal malignancies and especially gastric adenocarcinoma. Linitis plastica (LP), which is a specific form of gastric neoplasia, locally penetrates through the gastric wall to reach the peritoneum. Lymph node involvement is frequent and metastatic sites are almost exclusively observed in the abdominal cavity. The meningeal localization is extremely rare with only a few cases described in the literature. We report here, over a five-year period, four cases of CM on a total of eighty linitis cases diagnosed and treated in our institution, which represent 5% of a non selected linitis population. The clinical manifestations were clearly poor, and characterized by aspecific neurological signs. The diagnosis was made by the discovery of signet cells in the cerebrospinal fluid. Invasive treatment, consisting of intrathecal infusion of chemotherapy, was undertaken with mixed clinical response and no cytological normalization of the cerebrospinal fluid (CSF). In conclusion, our observation which is based on a large series of successive gastric linitis, demonstrates a 5% frequency of developing CM with a predominance among metastatic patients. Furthermore, the diagnosis of CM must be done as soon as possible because of the clear effectiveness of a therapeutic approach on the improvement of symptoms and quality of life.