Tumors of the thoracic cage

Abstract

Tumors of the chest wall comprise all growths affecting tissues of a similar character elsewhere in the body. While they do not present any special pathological characters they do, because of their location, present special surgical problems. The differentiation between benign and malignant growths in the fibrous and cartilage groups is, as elsewhere, difficult and cannot be done on histologic appearances only. When operated upon by a surgeon unaccustomed to treating thoracic lesions, these tumors are perhaps likely to be removed incompletely because the surgeon fears to open the chest widely. They should be operated upon always with a closed type of anesthesia, preferably of the intralaryngeal or intratracheal type. The anesthetist as well as the surgeon should be accustomed to handling thoracic cases. Radiotherapy cannot be expected to have much effect on most of the primary conditions and should be used as a rule, only when surgical removal is impossible. Because they occur rather infrequently and are the most interesting of the group, case reports of the primary lesions of ribs and cartilages have been given in some detail. ∗ ∗ Cases I, II, III, IV, V, XIII and XV were reported previously in The Journal of Tboracic Surgery, 9: 145–159 December, 1939.