2001 Volume 15 Issue 5 Pages 619-624
Malignant melanoma often presents multiple pulmonary metastases and results in a poor prognosis. The majority of recurrent malignant melanomas appear within 5 years after the initial treatment. We report a case of solitary pulmonary metastasis 12 years after the initial surgery. The patient was a 45-year-old woman who had received an operation and 5 courses of chemotherapy for malignant melanoma in the right thigh 12 years earlier. She consulted our department because of an abnormal shadow on chest X-ray film. Chest CT revealed a tumor with a diameter of 25 mm in right S4 lung invading into S3. The tumor was resected by partial resection of the right S3 and S4 lung and diagnosed as a pulmonary metastasis of malignant melanoma histologically. We have experienced 5 resected cases of pulmonary metastasis of malignant melanoma in our department. These cases show that pulmonary metastasis of malignant melanoma occur regardless of the long disease-free interval (DFI). When a chest abnormal shadow is found in a patient with a history of malignant melanoma even after a long DFI, pulmonary metastasis should be included in the differential diagnosis.