Early paraneoplastic syndrome in medical oncology: clinicopathological analysis of 1694 patients treated over 20 years.

During the period of 1963-1982 we treated at our hospital 1694 patients with diagnosed internal malignancies. Of them, paraneoplastic syndrome as the first manifestation of the disease was found in 127 (7.4%). In 79 patients (4.6%) this first symptoms has also been an early manifestation of the malignoma (good general condition, without typical clinical symptoms of cancer). The paraneoplastic syndrome as the first symptom of the disease was manifested mainly as rheumatologic (58 patients; 3.4%) and thrombophlebitis (33 patients; 1.9%) symptoms. While thrombophlebitis as the first symptom of the disease was at the same time only in 48% also an early symptom, rheumatologic syndromes were also early symptoms in as many as 74% of cases. Hemoblastoses, lymphomas, and plasmacytomas are diseases which were accompanied by a paraneoplastic syndrome not only as the first but also as an early manifestation of the disease.