A Case Report of Omental Metastasis of Pleomorphic Carcinoma of the Lung which regrowed Surprisingly Fast after Surgical Resection

Ryo Tamura, Hiroyuki Kobayashi, Yukihiro Imai*, Akira Miki, Kenji Uryuhara, Noriyuki Okada, Satoshi Kaihara, Yosikazu Masai, Tokiharu Miyahara and Ryo Hosotani

Department of Surgery and Department of Pathology*, Kobe City Medical Center General Hospital

Pulmonary pleomorphic carcinoma is rare but its prognosis is poor. We reported a case of abdominal metastasis of pleomorphic carcinoma regrowing within 3 weeks after resection. A 50-year-old man, who had undergone radical resection for pulmonary pleomorphic carcinoma 5 months earlier and admitted for anorexia and fatigue, was found in abdominal computed tomography to have a left upper quadrant mass suspected of being a gastrointestinal tumor. Worsening tumor hemorrhaging and symptoms necessitated emergency open surgical tumor resection. The pathological diagnosis was omental pleomorphic carcinoma metastasis. Although we completely resected the tumor macroscopically, it regrew to the preoperational size on postoperative days (POD) 19. The tumor grew continuously and at POD 46, the patient died of multi organ failure caused by obstructive jaundice, respiratory failure, and anemia. The former two were due to compression of porta hepatis and diaphragm by the regrowing tumor, the latter was due to intra-tumor hemorrhage.

Key words
pleomorphic carcinoma, metastasis

Reprint requests
Ryo Tamura Department of Pediatric Surgery, Kobe Children's Hospital
1-1-1 Takakuradai, Suma-Ku, Kobe, 654-0081 JAPAN

Accepted
July 22, 2009

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