Axillary skin metastasis of renal cell carcinoma-Case report

Metastatic diseases are seen in approximately 25% of all cases with renal cell carcinoma and sometimes they can appear in unusual sites.

We present a 35-year old patient with a painful left axillary mass which causes the functional impairment of the left arm. The axillary mass appeared 2 years after the nephrectomy performed for a left renal cell carcinoma. Numerous metastases have been identified through CT scans during the postoperative evolution of the disease for which the patient underwent adjuvant therapy with tyrosine-kinase inhibitors.

Particular to our case is not just the rare metastatic site but also the fact that the tumor appeared despite the adjuvant therapy with tyrosine-kinase inhibitors. Unfortunately, the prognosis of metastatic RCC with skin metastasis is in most cases unfavorable.

We believe that our case could add more information to subsequent measures, complete the frame of rare oncologic cases and consolidate the data published on the topic so far.