Rarity among the rare-large and invasive thymoma, a case report and review

• Main Authors: Khadija Tayabali, Hussein Pothiwalla, Jason Thole, Binh Nguyen
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Taylor & Francis Group 2020-05-01
• Series: Journal of Community Hospital Internal Medicine Perspectives
• Subjects: thymoma; rare tumors; thymic carcinoma; masaoka stage; mediastinal masses; invasive thymoma; radiographic images of thymoma; review article on thymoma treatment
• Online Access: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/20009666.2020.1766819

Thymomas are rare tumors of the thymic epithelium with an incidence of 1.5 cases in a million, with a wide spectrum of morphological, pathologic characteristics, and clinical presentations. Despite its benign histological appearance, it can invade nearby structures or metastasize hence clinicians need to have a high index of suspicion for early diagnosis. The natural history of the disease is seldom predictable and ranges anywhere from indolent to aggressive malignant course. In this review, we report a case of invasive thymoma in a patient whose presenting complaint was intermittent chest pain x 2 years that had gone undiagnosed. Complete surgical resection is the cornerstone of treatment in early presentation, but with the case of our patient who presented with a locally advanced thymoma treatment, her treatment options were challenging and had to be a multimodal approach with a combination of surgery, chemotherapy and radiation therapy to reduce the chances of recurrence and improve survival. Given the rarity of this presentation, the clinicopathological characteristics that influence the survival of patients with these tumors are still under debate, and guidelines for management for advanced disease are yet to be defined hence warranting our review on this discussion.