an islet cell neuroendocrine tumor is not the kind of pancreatic cancer that kills you in six months. The fast killers are exocrine: the cells that produce enzy

an islet cell neuroendocrine tumor is not the kind of pancreatic cancer that kills you in six months. The fast killers are exocrine: the cells that produce enzymes that digest protein. As you can imagine, since soft tissues contain a lot of proteins, having too much of those enzymes is not so good. This could have been any of a number of functional or nonfunctional neuroendocrine tumors, but the prognosis really would be quite a bit better. As I said in another comment, you can still have some pretty unpleasant digestive issues, simply because it's a rather delicate digestive organ. There's a common saying in surgery: eat when you can, sleep when you can, and don't touch the pancreas. He could have a ductal obstruction, the pancreas could have necrosed. All his beta cells may have failed, causing him to become a rather old new-onset Type I diabetic (no, it's not the normal presentation of DM I, but PETs aren't common.) He could have had a completely unrelated pneumonia. I've heard some say he's still very actively managing his diet. If a doctor or nutritionist or dietitian isn't cut in on that diet, then it's probably riskier. Last I checked, this guy isn't risk averse. He could have had any number of viral illnesses that would have taken a toll on anyone, it could have been a nasty case of mononucleosis, and, given his potentially partially compromised digestive system, the toll would be especially heavy on him. On the nasty end, maybe on a recent foreign trip he got cholera or tuberculosis. Who knows. The differential is to wide to narrow it down, but the pancreatic cancer thing is getting old. A PET =! pancreatic cancer. Based on the report, I'd go with a pneumonia, or some other infectious process that would have a substantial exogenous metabolic component, or a nasty GI bug, which would affect absorption of nutrients. Neither of which is lethal if treated, and the treatments are IV antibiotics, usually a fairly certain cure.