Occult tumor cells in pelvic lymph nodes and parametrial tissue of small-sized FIGO IB1 squamous cell carcinomas of the uterine cervix - results of a pilot study

In patients with small cervical carcinomas (<2.5 cm in largest dimension), OTCD can only rarely be detected by immunohistochemistry after careful handling of resected lymph nodes using step sectioning for routine histologic examination and complete processing of parametrial pelvic tissue. Therefore, tumor recurrence in those patients appears to be due to occult residual tumor cells that were not resected during the classical Wertheim-Meigs procedure or that were disseminated during the surgical procedure and persisted in situ.