Dear Friends,
today I am showing preop radiographs for knee surgery of a 71-year-old man.
What do you see?
More images will be shown on Wednesday.
Click here to see new images
Dear friends, showing additional images of the sternum taken six years earlier, in 2014.
What do you think?
Click here to see the answer
Findings: PA chest is unremarkable (A). The lateral radiograph shows an expanding lytic lesion in the sternal manubrium (B, circle).
Cone down view shows the lesion better (C, arrows). Sagittal, coronal and axial unenhanced CT taken six years earlier (2014) demonstrate that the cortical bone is broken in several places, suggesting an aggressive process (D-F, arrows). A soft-tissue mass is not visible.
No other skeletal lesions were found. Biopsy of the sternum confirmed the diagnosis of solitary myeloma (plasmocytoma), that was subsequently treated. The patient remained asymptomatic.
Final diagnosis: Plasmocytoma of the sternum
Congratulations to Priyanka Chhabra and Olena, who made the correct diagnosis. And kudos to all of you who saw the lesion in the lateral chest radiograph.
Teaching point: Remember that a lytic lesion of the sternum in an adult is malignant until proven otherwise. Main etiologies are primary tumors (chondrosarcoma) and metastases.
Reviewing the literature, I found a case report with similar findings: Solitary plasmacytoma of the sternum with a spiculated periosteal reaction: A case report. ONCOLOGY LETTERS 9: 191-194, 2015