Intrathoracic lipoma of the chest wall that appeared relatively rapidly and could be resected and diagnosed by minimally invasive thoracoscopic surgery: A case report

• Published in: Respirology case reports Vol. 10; no. 5; pp. e0946 - n/a
• Main Authors: Hirai, Yoshimitsu, Mikasa, Yurina, Iguchi, Hideto, Fusamoto, Aya, Yata, Yumi, Ohashi, Takuya, Nishimura, Yoshiharu
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Chichester, UK John Wiley & Sons, Ltd 01.05.2022; John Wiley & Sons, Inc; Wiley
• Subjects: Adipocytes; Asymptomatic; Case Report; Case Reports; intrathoracic lipoma of the chest wall; Liposarcoma; Magnetic resonance imaging; Medical diagnosis; Medical prognosis; minimally invasive thoracoscopic surgery; Radiography; Surgery; Tomography; Tumors; minimally invasive thoracoscopic surgery; intrathoracic lipoma of the chest wall
• ISSN: 2051-3380; 2051-3380
• DOI: 10.1002/rcr2.946

The occurrence of lipoma in the thoracic cavity is relatively rare, and it is clinically difficult to distinguish it from liposarcoma. We report a case of intrathoracic lipoma that was pathologically diagnosed and differentiated from liposarcoma after minimally invasive thoracoscopic tumour resection. A 35‐year‐old male patient without any symptoms was referred to our hospital due to an abnormal shadow on chest x‐ray. Computed tomography showed a low‐attenuated round‐shaped mass of 3.6 cm × 2.3 cm in diameter in the left chest wall. On magnetic resonance imaging, the mass was displayed as a high, high and low signal mass on T1‐weighted imaging (WI), T2WI and T2WI with fat suppression, respectively. We suspected a chest wall‐type lipoma, but because it appeared in a relatively short period of time and we thought it could be liposarcoma, we performed minimally invasive thoracoscopic surgery for diagnosis and treatment. The tumour was a stalked tumour with a capsule, contiguous to the wall pleura with only a single cord‐like structure. The majority of the tumour was found free in the pleural cavity. The tumour was diagnosed as a lipoma by histopathological examination. A relatively rare intrathoracic lipoma, which is clinically important to differentiate from liposarcoma, was diagnosed by minimally invasive thoracoscopic surgery.