Isolated Right Ventricular Metastasis in a Woman with Advanced Hepatocellular Carcinoma after Palliative Therapy

Abstract

Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) with cardiac metastasis represents a group of rarity and poor prognosis. Few case reports have described this patient entity, and it remains unclear regarding the optimal treatment and predicted outcome for these patients. In our case, we represented a 67-year-old female patient with presentations of dyspnea and heart murmur, which conducted to the diagnosis of advanced HCC with isolated right ventricular metastasis. Because of multiple comorbidities regarding cardiac and pulmonary systems, she received best supportive care and survived 2 months after initial diagnosis. A systemic literature review of 80 published cases (including our patient) since the 1950s was also performed from PubMed, and the data were gathered from the medical record and literature reviews. In our review, patients with advanced HCC and cardiac metastasis involved the right heart mainly with a predominance of right atrium (53%). Meanwhile the overall 3-month survival rate in our review was 70.7%. In subgroup analysis, the overall 3-month survival was highest (97%) in patients treated with surgery and other therapies, and lowest (27%) in patients with best supportive care. To our knowledge, this is the first comprehensive literature review addressing the epidemiology, optimal treatment, and prognosis for advanced-stage HCC with cardiac metastasis. We suggest that abnormal cardiac murmur in patients with history of HCC should prompt investigation for tumor involvement of the heart. We also emphasize individualized treatment as well as prognostic measurement accordingly.