Cholangiocarcinoma is a cancer of the bile ducts, which drain bile from the liver into the small intestine. Cholangiocarcinoma is a relatively rare adenocarcinoma, with an annual incidence of 1–2 cases per 100,000 in the Western world, but rates of cholangiocarcinoma have been rising worldwide over the past several decades. Prominent symptoms of cholangiocarcinoma include abnormal liver function tests, abdominal pain, jaundice, weight loss, and sometimes generalized itching, fever, or changes in stool or urine color. The disease is diagnosed through a combination of blood tests, imaging, endoscopy, and sometimes surgical exploration, though it commonly presents at Stage III or IV: too late to be resected surgically. Though most patients present without any risk factors evident, known risk factors for cholangiocarcinoma include primary sclerosing cholangitis, congenital liver malformations, infection with the parasitic liver flukes Opisthorchis viverrini or Clonorchis sinensis, and exposure to Thorotrast (thorium dioxide). Cholangiocarcinoma is considered to be an incurable and rapidly lethal disease unless all of its tumors can be fully resected. There is no potentially curative treatment except surgery, but unfortunately most patients have advanced and inoperable disease at the time of diagnosis.

Read the rest of this article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cholangiocarcinoma

_______________________________ Today's selected anniversaries:

1776:

American Revolutionary War: British forces defeated the Continental Army at the Battle of Trois-Rivières, the last major battle fought on Quebec soil that was part of the American colonists' invasion of Quebec. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Trois-Rivi%C3%A8res

1783:

Iceland's Laki craters began an eight-month eruption, triggering major famine and massive fluorine poisoning. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laki

1949:

Nineteen Eighty-Four, a dystopian political novel by English writer George Orwell about life in the fictional totalitarian government of Oceania, was first published. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nineteen_Eighty-Four

1950:

Thomas Blamey became Australia's first and currently only Field Marshal. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Blamey

1995:

Danish-Greenlandic programmer Rasmus Lerdorf released the first public version of the scripting language PHP for producing dynamic web pages. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PHP

_____________________________ Wiktionary's word of the day:

cupidity (n): Extreme greed, especially for wealth http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/cupidity

___________________________ Wikiquote quote of the day:

History does not always repeat itself. Sometimes it just yells, "Can't you remember anything I told you?" and lets fly with a club. --John W. Campbell http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/John_W._Campbell