Mediastinal Tumours: Surgical Treatment in Forty-five Consecutive Cases

Abstract

Between the years 1964 and 1970, 45 consecutive patients, 24 males and 21 females, with ages ranging between 7 months and 74 years, were operated upon for mediastinal tumours. Fourteen per cent of the patients were asymptomatic and their lesions were detected on routine chest X-ray films. The clinical and pathological findings spanned a wide variety of tumours. Fourteen patients (31%) of the 45 were classified as malignant. Two patients (4.4%) died early in the postoperative period and four (8.8%) later—9 months to 4 years following operation. All the late deaths were patients with malignant lesions.