Primary Liver Tumours – Presentation, Diagnosis and Surgical Treatment

Abstract

Cystic lesions of the liver such as dysontogenic cysts and cystic disease of the liver, haeman‐ gioma, focal nodular hyperplasia (FNH), disturbed fat distribution of the liver, hamartoma and liver cell adenoma are summarized under the term primary benign hepatic tumours. On the other hand, malignant tumours of the liver are classified into primary and secondary tumours. Primary malignant hepatic tumours are hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) and cholangiocellular carcinoma (CCC). In addition to the aforementioned tumours one also has to consider rare and very rare primary hepatic tumours, e.g. hemangioendothelioma and hepatosarcoma as well as hepatoblastoma in children. Secondary tumours of the liver, i.e. liver metastases, may result from various primary tumours located throughout the entire body and need to be discussed separately. Another important group of liver lesions are parasitic liver tumours, particularly Echinococcus cysticus and Echinococcus alveolaris, which also do not emanate primarily from the liver tissue.