A Rare Case of Sunitinib-Induced Rhabdomyolysis in Renal Cell Carcinoma

We report a rare case of metastatic renal cell carcinoma (RCC) in a patient who developed rhabdomyolysis while on sunitinib. He was admitted to the hospital due to muscle weakness, fatigue, poor oral intake, and difficulty swallowing in March 2017. He was found to have pancytopenia, liver failure, kidney failure, high uric acid, and increased creatine phosphokinase of more than 5000. He quickly developed lactic acidosis and acute respiratory failure. He was transferred to the ICU, but his condition declined rapidly. He died 3 days later. In this article we discussed about sunitinib-mediated inhibition of adenosine monophosphate kinase (AMPK) as a possible pathophysiology of rhabdomyolysis. Our case is the third sunitinib-induced rhabdomyolysis reported in the literature.