An atypical presentation of renal cell carcinoma in a child: A neck mass

Abstract

The most common malignant diseases of the head and neck in the adolescent period are acute leukemia, Hodgkin's disease, non-Hodgkin's lymphoma, nasopharyngeal carcinoma, and thyroid carcinoma. Although renal cell carcinoma (RCC) may metastasize in the cervical lymph nodes, both occurrence and presentation as a neck mass are rare in the childhood period. In this report, we present a sixteen-year-old girl who was admitted with a left neck mass at presentation. The primary tumor was found to be located in the left kidney and both masses were surgically removed, revealing a diagnosis of a translocation renal cell carcinoma with metastases. Distant metastases of abdominal and thoracic malignancies may present with metastatic lymph nodes, and should be included in the differential diagnosis of the neck masses in children.