Cardiac hemangioma of the left atrial appendag: a case report and discussion

Cardiac hemangioma is an extremely rare, benign vascular tumor of the heart. In contrast to myxoma, hemangioma rarely involves left atrial tissue in adults and little information about the tumor is available. We encountered a 65-year-old woman with a left atrial hemangioma arising in the appendage and growing like an extracardiac mass. The tumor was removed from the left atrium with all the left appendage under cardiopulmonary bypass. Histopathological examination revealed that it was a cavernous-type hemangioma. Among the five described cases, this case was the only one in which the tumor arose from the appendage and grew into the pericardial cavity with resultant paroxystic atrial fibrillation.