ABSTRACT
Dr. Renu Virmani: A 55-year-old white man, who died Dec 17, 1968, had been well until about September 1963 (just over five years before death) when he noted substernal chest pain without radiation during exertion and relief of the pain with rest. This pain occurred about once or twice a month thereafter until 18 months before death when it disappeared entirely. In about March 1967 (21 months before death), he noted soreness in the left side of the mouth and the next month when he returned to his physician to have his “heart medicine” prescription renewed, a mass was palpated beneath the left mandible. An ulcer in the mouth appeared in August 1967, and biopsy disclosed squamous cell carcinoma. In September 1967, he was admitted to the Clinical Center of the National Institutes of Health.
