Persistent Dark Eye Circles Should Raise Suspicion of Endocrine Tumors
About ten years ago, an asthma patient came to me for treatment of his asthma, accompanied by his wife. Her dark eye circles were especially prominent, so striking that one could not forget them. After finishing the consultation and treatment for her husband, I casually asked this family member when her dark eye circles had first appeared. She told me the dark circles had been there for a very long time.At the time I warned her to be alert for major diseases of the gynecological system. Because I had just then read an article by the famous TCM gynecologist Liu Fengwu, in which he mentioned that if a woman has dark eye circles, she generally has a gynecological disease—especially one that could cause pelvic effusion.A few years later, this family member contacted me to tell me she had been diagnosed with thyroid cancer. This was both within my expectation and a bit surprising. I had indeed worried that she might have a tumor at the time, but what I suspected was a tumor of the female reproductive system; I had not imagined it would be another tumor of the endocrine system.Later, I took on an ovarian cancer patient, and at first glance I also noticed her especially conspicuous dark eye circles. I asked the patient how long she had had them, and she told me they had been present for more than ten years. As her ovarian cancer treatment took effect, the dark circles would fade or even disappear; when the disease recurred, the dark circles would reappear, and when it worsened, the darkness around the eyes deepened.Today I saw a testicular cancer patient; during the video consultation, at first glance I noticed the patient's dark eye circles. During the inquiry I specifically asked when these dark circles had appeared. The patient said they had been there since he started working in his twenties, more than ten years ago now. When his surgery and chemotherapy were effective, the dark circles lightened somewhat; his eye circles used to be even darker than they are now.Last year I took on a melanoma patient whose first impression on me was also very obvious dark eye circles. I asked her how long she had had them, and she told me they had been there since college; at the same time, she—who used not to feel the cold—began to feel cold. Moreover, this patient had worried throughout college that she might get melanoma; her personality was very sensitive, her reactions to the outside world sharper than most people's, and she had mild anxiety.Recently this patient had a full gene test, and no gene mutations related to typical melanoma were found. Many signs suggest that this patient's melanoma was most likely caused by endocrine imbalance rather than a conventional melanoma. In fact, she had tried almost all the conventional melanoma treatments, all in vain; rather, it was radiotherapy—which has a low response rate for melanoma—that relieved her condition.These four patients share the same feature: long-standing dark eye circles, and in two of them the dark circles lessened after effective treatment. Their tumors were all related to endocrine problems. This observation made me realize that dark eye circles may be a sign that some patients with endocrine imbalance are developing cancer.However, the dark eye circles I refer to here are different from the transient dark circles of ordinary people. Ordinary people occasionally get dark circles after staying up late, but after making up sleep the circles quickly fade. Only the kind that persists for a very long time is a pathological dark eye circle; it may be a signal of endocrine imbalance and should attract the attention of the patient and the vigilance of clinicians.Oncologists may find some therapeutic ideas by observing a patient's dark eye circles. If a patient has prominent dark circles, the treatment of their tumor should emphasize regulating the patient's endocrine system. Endocrine-system disruption often means the patient's homeostasis has been destroyed; over time, carcinogenesis is no surprise.