1993 Volume 32 Issue 6 Pages 502-507
An 84-year-old man with non-Hodgkin's malignant lymphoma presented with a pathological fracture of the femur and also an intra-atrial mass on echocardiography. The patient was given palliative low-dose chemotherapy, but died of tumor dissemination, hypercalcemia, and dehydration. Autopsy revealed diffuse large B-cell lymphoma involving multiple bones and lymph nodes (the latter were not detected during staging), and a solitary mass on the posterior wall of the right atrium. This rare lesion appeared to be due to hematogenouss pread, since the myocardium and pericardium were free of tumor infiltration. A literature review indicated that the frequency of cardiac involvement differed between contemporary and earlier reports, mainly due to the availability of increasingly sophisticated diagnostic methods and improvements in chemotherapy.
(Internal Medicine 32: 502-507, 1993)
