RECURRENT AND SO-CALLED METASTATIC GIANT CELL TUMOR

Abstract

As information advances, it is obvious that clinical entities are established on the basis of a specific etiology, rather than on abstract classification. For this reason, as additional facts are disclosed, the time honored controversy concerning the inflammatory or neoplastic nature of giant cell tumors and bone cysts is giving place to a discussion of the actual causative processes of these lesions. The evidence presented in a previous paper¹ favored the view that these growths constitute a single entity, and that the giant cell tumor arises as an abnormal phase in the resorption of temporary bone in response to trauma, while the bone cyst presents the healing phase of the same lesion. Nevertheless, in view of the amount of attention recently directed to so-called metastatic giant cell tumors in the literature, it is necessary to present further evidence concerning a certain group of these lesions to delineate them more