CASE REPORTS   

Minerva Pneumologica 2009 December;48(4):389-94

Copyright © 2009 EDIZIONI MINERVA MEDICA

language: English

Occult lung cancer detected at CT screening 15 years after craniotomy for a single brain metastasis

Scanagatta P., Veronesi G., Pelosi G., Funicelli L., Borri A., Galetta D., Gasparri R., Petrella F., Bertolaccini L., Solli P., Spaggiari L.

¹ Division of Thoracic Surgery, European Institute of Oncology, Milan, Italy 2 Division of Pathology, European Institute of Oncology, Milan, Italy 3 Division of Radiology, European Institute of Oncology, Milan, Italy 4 University of Milan, School of Medicine, Milan, Italy 5 Division of Thoracic Surgery, S. Croce and Carle Hospital, Cuneo, Italy

This article reports the case of a 58-year-old man affected by multifocal adenocarcinoma of the right upper pulmonary lobe, which was diagnosed 15 years after surgical resection of a brain metastasis of adenocarcinoma. Following a low dose computed tomography scan for screening of lung cancer and a positive total-body positron-emission tomography, two nodules were detected in the right upper lobe, with no extrathoracic localization of disease or brain local recurrence. The patient under-went a right upper lobectomy and the pathologic examination of the lung tumor showed a multifocal adenocarcinoma (stage pT4pN0). The brain metastasis excised 15 years before demonstrated the same features as lung adenocarcinoma along with consistent immunoreactivity for thyroid transcription factor-1, a lung tissue-associated marker.