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World J Gastrointest Surg. May 27, 2021; 13(5): 406-418
Published online May 27, 2021. doi: 10.4240/wjgs.v13.i5.406
Benign vs malignant pancreatic lesions: Molecular insights to an ongoing debate
Mahmoud Aldyab, Tony El Jabbour, Megan Parilla, Hwajeong Lee
Mahmoud Aldyab, Hwajeong Lee, Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine, Albany Medical Center, Albany, NY 12208, United States
Tony El Jabbour, Megan Parilla, Department of Pathology, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, New York, NY 10065, United States
Author contributions: Aldyab M, El Jabbour T and Lee H drafted the manuscript; Aldyab M and Lee H prepared the figures, Parilla M and Lee H contributed to the editing of the manuscript; Lee H and Aldyab M provided the microscopic images; Aldyab M, El Jabbour T, Parilla M and Lee H gave final approval of the version to be published and are agreeable to be accountable for all aspects of the work in ensuring that questions that arise are investigated and the information is accurate.
Conflict-of-interest statement: There is no conflict of interest associated with any of the senior author or other coauthors contributed their efforts in this manuscript.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article that was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/Licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Corresponding author: Hwajeong Lee, MD, Associate Professor, Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine, Albany Medical Center, 47 New Scotland Ave MC81, Albany, NY 12208, United States. leeh5@amc.edu
Received: February 5, 2021
Peer-review started: February 5, 2021
First decision: March 16, 2021
Revised: March 30, 2021
Accepted: May 7, 2021
Article in press: May 7, 2021
Published online: May 27, 2021
Processing time: 105 Days and 1.5 Hours
Core Tip

Core Tip: Multiple benign entities share clinical and radiological features with pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma requiring histologic examination to render the final diagnosis. However, the diagnosis of well differentiated adenocarcinoma can be challenging in a limited sample. Certain morphologic features and molecular markers can be used to resolve this issue.