Renal cell carcinoma: Atypical metastasis to inguinal lymph nodes

Renal cell carcinoma (RCC) is a common tumor of the urinary tract. It is known to have variable presentations due to the extremely vascular nature of the organ. RCC are known to metastasize to lungs, bone, and brain commonly but atypical metastasis to various sites are reported in literature but as very rare pathology. We report a case of a 60-year-old female who presented with multiple inguinal and axillary lymph node enlargements which on excision biopsy showed metastatic RCC. RCC can present with synchronous metastatic deposits in the various organs. RCC can metastasize to some atypical sites as well such as thyroid, orbit, and neck as mentioned earlier in literature. The patient presenting with extra-regional lymph nodes like inguinal and axillary is extremely rare, and so far only one clinical case could be found from India in 2008. A 61-year-old female presented in the emergency department with left flank pain and hematuria. Imaging showed left swollen kidney but multiple lymph nodes in retroperitoneum, left inguinal and axillary region. Excisional biopsy confirmed metastatic renal clear cell carcinoma. The case was referred to an oncologist after left radical nephrectomy for further treatment. Renal cancer is quite common aggressive disease. Due to its vascular nature, it may present quite atypically as evident from literature. Although treatment of metastatic carcinoma is still controversial surgery is the mainstay of treatment and guidelines consider metastasectomy and cytoreductive nephrectomy as valid option followed by targeted systemic therapies. RCC has quite a high potential to metastasize in the versatile pattern, in our case, it is evident that valid management is still surgery but needs support from the multidisciplinary team.