Review

Surgical management of abdominal and retroperitoneal Castleman's disease

Pascal Bucher , Gilles Chassot , Guillaume Zufferey , Frederic Ris , Olivier Huber and Philippe Morel

Clinic of Visceral and Transplantation Surgery, Department of Surgery, Geneva University Hospital, Switzerland

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World Journal of Surgical Oncology 2005, 3:33doi:10.1186/1477-7819-3-33

Published:	7 June 2005

Abstract

Background

Abdominal and retroperitoneal Castleman's disease could present either as a localized disease or as a systemic disease. Castleman's disease is a lymphoid hyperplasia related to human Herpes virus type 8, which could have an aggressive behavior, similar to that of malignant lymphoid neoplasm mainly with the systemic type, or a benign one in its localized form.

Methods

The authors report two cases of localized Castleman's disease in the retroperitoneal space and review the current and recent progress in the knowledge of this atypical disease.

Cases presentation

The two patients were young healthy women presenting with a hyper vascular peri-renal mass suggestive of malignant tumor. Both have been resected in-toto. One of them had an extensive resection with nephrectomy, while the second had a kidney preserving surgery. Pathological examination revealed localized Castleman's disease and surgical margins were free of disease. Postoperative course was uneventful, and after more than 5-years of follow-up no recurrences have been observed.

Conclusion

Localized Castleman's disease should be considered when facing a solid hypervascular abdominal or retroperitoneal mass. A better knowledge of this disorder and its characteristic would help surgeon to avoid unnecessarily extensive resection for this benign disorder when dealing with abdominal or retroperitoneal tumors. Surgical resection is curative for the localized form, when complete, while splenectomy could be indicated for the systemic form.