Volume 71 Number 5 October 2004	back to contents

From the 1Department of Intensive Care Unit, King Fahad National Guard Hospital Riyadh, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia; 2Department of Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine, King Abdulaziz National Guard Hospital, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia; and 3Department of Pathology, 4Division of Endocrinology, 5Division of Cardiothoracic Surgery, and 6Division of Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine, Mount Sinai School of Medicine, New York, NY.

Address all correspondence to Alvin S. Teirstein, M.D., Box 1232, Mount Sinai School of Medicine, One East 100th Street, New York, NY 10029.

Supported by the Catherine and Henry J. Gaisman Foundation.

Accepted for publication January 2004.

ABSTRACT
Many neoplastic tumors exhibit paraneoplastic syndromes manifested by endocrinopathy. This is particularly true of intrathoracic tumors such as lung cancers, thymomas, carcinoid tumors and mediastinal germ cell neoplasm. Fibrous tumors of the pleura are rare intrathoracic tumors, which are usually benign and often grow to huge size. A subset of these neoplasms present with the syndrome of hypoglycemia. Although first reported more than 70 years ago, the diagnosis is rarely considered when a patient presents with syncope and hypoglycemia. This article reports a patient who presented with a large pleural mass and a hypoglycemic syndrome. (The disease was surgically cured.) The probable mechanism of hypoglycemia is discussed.

KEY WORDS
Pleura, tumor, hypoglycemia.

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