Sister Mary Joseph's nodule: a clue to finding pancreatic cancer in a patient previously affected by gastric cancer.

An 82-year-old man with Sister Mary Joseph's nodule (SMJN) is reported. He had a past history of gastric cancer, which had been removed in its early stage. Histopathological findings, in which CA19-9 and other markers, such as PCNA and p53, were strongly positive in SMJN but negative in specimens from the gastric cancer, suggested that the nodule had derived from another internal malignancy and a detailed search led to the discovery of a pancreatic cancer.