Intrarenal schwannoma: a report of four cases including three cellular variants

Renal schwannomas are extraordinarily rare neoplasms; only six have been reported, the majority of which occurred in the renal pelvis. We report the clinical and pathologic features of four additional cases. The resected kidney in all patients contained a well-demarcated, yellow-tan, smooth, and bulging intraparenchymal tumor (mean size, 9.7 cm; range, 4 to 16 cm). Microscopically, three cases were classified as cellular schwannomas, and one was a usual-type schwannoma, with degenerative nuclear atypia. By immunohistochemistry, all tumors were strongly S-100 protein positive and negative for pan-cytokeratin, CD57, smooth muscle actin, desmin, and CD34. Epithelial elements were not noted in the tumors, and there was no history of any clinical syndromes in these patients. Analysis of the four cases showed the mean age at presentation to be 47 years (range, 18 to 84 years), with no sex predisposition (two men, two women). Most patients were asymptomatic, and all received a diagnosis of renal cell carcinoma and treated as having such. Recognition and awareness of these rare, benign tumors will assist in the differential diagnosis of spindle cell tumors of the kidney and prevent their misdiagnosis as sarcomatoid carcinomas of the kidney or renal sarcomas. Our study, the largest series to date of renal schwannomas, demonstrates a predilection for the cellular variant in the kidney, documents that these tumors may present in the nonhilar region of the kidney, and provides clinical evidence of their benign biologic behavior.