Primary Pleural Lymphoma with Dense Pleural Thickening

Abstract

A 72-year-old man was referred to our hospital because of persistent right chest pain and an abnormal shadow on chest X-ray. Thoracic computed tomography showed a right upper pleural nodule and massive right pleural thickening with an ipsilateral pleural effusion, which partially extended to the left pleura. The pleural tumor showed an intense standardized uptake value of 28.5 on fluorodeoxyglucose positron emission tomography/computed tomography. After performing a thoracic pleural biopsy, a diagnosis of primary pleural lymphoma, diffuse large B cell type, was made. Primary tumors account for about 5-10% of pleural neoplasms, which of 2.4% accounts for primary pleural lymphoma. Although, primary pleural lymphoma is an extremely rare tumor, it should be considered in the differential diagnosis of pleural thickening in the costophrenic recess with pleural effusion even if the patient has no apparent history of pyothorax associated with Epstein-Barr virus infection.