Surgical treatment of primary Tracheal Carcinoma in a Patient with Recklinghausen’s disease(Neurofibromatosis type 1

Abstract

This is the case of a 56-year-old man with signifi cant history of neurofi broma-tosisandsmokingwhopre-sentedwithrespiratorydistressandworkuprevealedtosis and smoking who pre-sented with respiratory distress and workup revealed intra-trachealmass.Eventhoughtheexpectationwasthetrachealtumortobeintra-tracheal mass. Even though the expectation was the tracheal tumor to be benignthepathologyrevealedmalignancy.Notably,pulmonarynoduleswereatbenign the pathology revealed malignancy. Notably, pulmonary nodules were at firstthoughttobebenigntumors,yetworkuprevealedtheseweremetastatic.fi rst thought to be benign tumors, yet workup revealed these were metastatic. PresenceoftworareconditionscancoexistanditisimportantforthecliniciansPresence of two rare conditions can coexist and it is important for the clinicians tokeepanopenmindwhilemanagingpatientswithnewlyfoundmasswhohaveto keep an open mind while managing patients with newly found mass who have historyofbenigntumors.Thiscasealsorepresentsgoodlearningopportunityhistory of benign tumors. This case also represents good learning opportunity forsurgicalmanagementofintratrachealtumorwhenintubationisachallengefor surgical management of intratracheal tumor when intubation is a challenge.