Primary Neoplasms of the Lung in Children and Adolescents: 22 Cases from a Single Institute

Purpose: Prim ary lung tum ors in children and adolescents are uncom m on. We report here on the clinical presentations, the m ethods of treatm ent, the results and the outcom es of a series of children w ith these rare tum ors. Materials and Methods: We conducted a retrospective review on all the patients less than 19 years of age w ith prim ary lung tum ors and who were treated at Samsung Medical Center between 1995 and 2009. Twenty two cases of primary lung tumors were reviewed and the clinical-pathological information concerning the tum or characteristics, the therapy and the follow-up was collected. Results: The average age of the 10 m ale patients and 12 fem ale patients was 11.5 years (range: 3 m onths to 18 years). O f the 22 prim ary lung tum ors, 18.2% (4/22) were benign, 36.4% (8/22) were of borderline m alignancy and 45.4% (10/22) were m alignant. The pathologic types were inflam m atory m yofibroblastic tum or (6/22), m ucoepiderm oid carcinom a (4), pleuropulmonary blastoma (2), adenocarcinoma (1), alveolar soft part sarcoma (1), m alignant lym phom a (1), leiom yom a (1), pulm onary leiom yom atous hamartoma (1), congenital pulmonary m yofibroblastic tum or (1), Langerhans’ cell histiocytosis (1), neurilemmoma (1), sclerosing pneumocytoma (so-called sclerosing hem angiom a) (1) and atypical carcinoid tum or (1). After surgery for the benign tumors, no postoperative recurrence was been observed during long-term follow-up. All the patients w ith the benign tum ors were alive w ith no evidence of disease. For the patients w ith the tum ors of borderline malignancy, one patient experienced recurrence, but there was no death from disease. For the group with m alignant tum ors, two patients died from untreatable m etastatic disease and 8 patients survived their disease on the long-term follow-up. Conclusion: The prim ary lung tum ors during childhood and adolescence had different characteristics com pared with their adult counterparts w ith respect to the incidence and prognosis. These facts m ust be considered when m aking the diagnosis and deciding on proper therapy. (J Lung Cancer 2009;8(2):103 󰠏 110)