Malignant Carcinoid Tumor of the Rectum in a Patient With Psoriatic Arthritis Treated With Etanercept

Abstract

The connection between malignancy risk and tumor necrosis factor alpha (TNFa) inhibitors is still a working field. Generally, less attention has been paid to their association with solid tumors compared to the mostly accepted risk for lymphoma. Etanercept is somewhat underrepresented compared to other drugs in the class and entities other than rheumatoid arthritis (RA) have not been widely included in large cohort studies exploring malignancy correlations. Nonetheless, lymphoma association to etanercept has been found in some series and many solid malignancies cases in the context of etanercept use for conditions other than RA have been described as single reports. We present the first described case of rectal carcinoid tumor developing after treatment with etanercept in a patient with psoriatic arthritis and explore the literature for evidence about the association between solid tumors and etanercept use in autoimmune diseases. J Med Cases. 2015;6(9):389-392 doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.14740/jmc2248w