Joseph Engel (1816-1899), author of a meaningful dissertation on tumors of the pituitary infundibulum: his report on the oldest preserved whole craniopharyngioma specimen.

Joseph Engel (1816-1899) was a Viennese anatomist and pathologist trained under the mentorship of Carl von Rokitansky (1804-1878), the man who laid the foundations of gross anatomical pathology. In 1839, Engel completed his first scientific project: the dissertation entitled "Über den Hirnanhang und den Trichter" (About the pituitary gland and the infundibulum). This work analyzed the pathological and clinical characteristics of the pituitary and infundibulum tumor specimens collected at the Vienna Pathologic-Anatomical Museum.

Cystic tumors of the pituitary infundibulum: seminal autopsy specimens (1899 to 1904) that allowed clinical-pathological craniopharyngioma characterization.

A heterogeneous group of epithelial cystic tumors developed at the infundibulum and the third ventricle disconcerted pathologists at the dawn of the twentieth century. Very little was known at that time about the physiological role played by the pituitary gland, and there was almost complete ignorance regarding the function of the hypothalamus. Acromegaly, or enlargement of acral body parts, described in 1886 by Pierre Marie, was the only disease linked to primary hypertrophies of the pituitary gland, known as "pituitary strumas".

Increase of papillary thyroid microcarcinoma and a plea for restrictive treatment: A retrospective study of 1,391 prospective documented patients.

Background: The incidence of papillary thyroid microcarcinomas (PMCs) has increased sharply and therefore the lack of consensus for treatment has become a clinical dilemma. Our aim was to evaluate a less-radical approach.

Methods: This study includes 1,391 patients with PMC treated at a single surgical referral center in the endemic goiter area in Austria.

Jakob Erdheim (1874-1937): father of hypophyseal-duct tumors (craniopharyngiomas).

Jakob Erdheim (1874-1937) was a Viennese pathologist who identified and defined a category of pituitary tumors known as craniopharyngiomas. He named these lesions "hypophyseal duct tumors" (Hypophysenganggeschwülste), a term denoting their presumed origin from cell remnants of the hypophyseal duct, the embryological structure through which Rathke's pouch migrates to form part of the pituitary gland. He described the two histological varieties of these lesions as the adamantinomatous and the squamous-papillary types.

Clear cell carcinoma arising in endometriosis of the rectum following progestin therapy.

A 40-year-old woman presented at our hospital with rectal stenosis. Computed tomography demonstrated a conglomerate tumor in the pelvis and malignant look-alike lesions in the liver and in both lungs. A palliative deep rectum resection was done.

Kawan bronchial brush/cell block technique. Facilitation of the routine diagnosis of bronchial neoplasms.

Objective: To evaluate cell block preparations as a tool for the diagnosis of pulmonary malignancy and to correlate the findings with those from brush cytology and histology from forceps biopsy.

Study Design: One hundred twenty consecutive samples from patients with primary or metastatic lung cancer were routinely processed and stained for cytologic and histologic examination. In addition to smears, a cell block was prepared from each brushing sample.