Laparoscopic resection of urinary bladder paraganglioma: a case report

The case report of a 55-year-old woman with an incidentally diagnosed urinary paraganglioma of the bladder is presented. The patient had no irritative voiding symptoms, hematuria or hypertension. She was diagnosed to have an immobile solid mass on the left side neighboring the lower segment of the uterus. Transvaginal ultrasonography revealed a well-limited ovoid mass with solid and cystic areas adjacent to the urinary bladder and the uterus. Tumor markers were within normal range. Laparoscopy was performed for the treatment of the mass and complete excision of the cyst was accomplished. Frozen section was performed revealing a benign cystic structure but the identification of the origin was left to definitive histopathological examination which showed paraganglioma of the bladder. Immunohistochemically, the tumor cells were strongly positive for chromogranin A and synaptophysin and there was focal positiveness for neuron specific enolase although vimentin and cytokeratin were negative.