Pancreas Matters - December 2022 Vol 5 No 2

Introduction

Multidisciplinary and multimodality management of complex pancreatic neuroendocrine tumour (NET): Case Report

A 57-year-old female presented to her GP with vague episodic symptoms which she attributed to possible low blood sugar. She reported palpitations and dizziness, and fainted on a few occasions. Her husband confirmed that she often awoke very drowsy. She had become aware that her symptoms improved after eating.

Endoscopic Ultrasound (EUS) for pancreatic diseases

The invention of the fibre optic endoscope in 1957 by South African- born gastroenterologist, Dr Basil Hirschowitz (a 1947 WITS graduate) and his undergraduate physics student, Larry Curtiss, is considered one of the most influential advances in medicine in the twentieth century. A year later (1958), ultrasound was first reported as useful in clinical practice. Endoscopy and ultrasound (endoscopic ultrasound - EUS) were combined in the early 1980s and allowed for unmatched views of mucosa and organs abutting endoscopically accessible areas. However, in the early phase of EUS, it did not gain wide-spread use in clinical practice. This changed in the 1990s when the radial endoscope was introduced.

Ethics: End of life and DNRs – the rights of the patient and what the implications are for the doctor

Do not resuscitate (DNR) orders are complex legal and ethical issues, requiring careful navigation by the healthcare team. At the height of the Covid pandemic, DNRs became one of the ways to manage the shortage of ICU beds. It is, however, not only the scarcity of resources that form the context for DNRs, the futility of life-prolonging treatment is also often a factor.