Table 1.

Pathologies of major pancreatic malignancies.

Tumor classification	Tumor type	Clinical significance
Pancreatic exocrine tumors (>95%)	Invasive ductal adenocarcinoma	The most common type of pancreatic exocrine neoplasm. Accounts for more than 80% of cases. Very poor prognosis.
	Acinar carcinoma	Accounts for less than 1% of cases. Fully malignant. 15% of cases are associated with metastatic fat necrosis. Better overall prognosis than ductal adenocarcinoma.
	Pancreatoblastoma	Accounts for less than 1% of cases. More common in infants and children than in adults. Less aggressive and better prognosis than ductal adenocarcinoma.
	Variants of ductal adenocarcinoma (adenosquamous, colloid, medullary, undifferentiated, etc.)	Adenosquamous (4% of cases), colloid (2%), others rare. Most share a similarly poor long-term prognosis, except for colloid carcinoma, which has a somewhat better prognosis.
	Cystic neoplasm with invasive carcinoma	Intraductal papillary mucinous neoplasm (IPMN) (2-3% of cases), mucinous cystic neoplasm (MCN) (1%), and solid-pseudopapillary neoplasm (SPT) (<1%). Better prognosis than ductal adenocarcinoma.
Pancreatic endocrine tumors (<5%)	Pancreatic neuroendocrine tumors (PNETs) (glucagonoma, VIPoma, gastrinoma etc.)	Commonly accompanied by a clinical syndrome due to aberrant hormone production. Fully malignant, with a 45% 10-year survival rate.