PERICARDIAL MALIGNANT MESOTHELIOMA - CASE-REPORT AND DISCUSSION OF IMMUNOHISTOCHEMICAL AND HISTOCHEMICAL FINDINGS

An extremely rare case of malignant mesothelioma of the pericardium is reported. The tumor appeared to be the biphasic type of diffuse malig nant mesothelioma which present many small to fine lipid droplets in t he cytoplasm, particularly that of the epithelial cell, and a positive immunohistochemical reaction with antibodies to low molecular weight cytokeratin (45-50 kDa) in all of the tumor cells. The literature is a lso reviewed and the presence of lipid droplets and the importance of the immunohistochemical positivity to low molecular weight cytokeratin for differential diagnosis from other malignant tumors, such as invas ive adenocarcinoma or primary sarcoma of the pleura, or soft tissue sa rcoma involving the pleura is discussed.