A Clinical Study on 41 Cases of Adrenal Tumors

Ryu, Soo Bang; Park, Young Woong; Oh, Bong Ryoul; Park, Yang Il

Abstract

We retrospectively analyzed 41 cases of adrenal tumors which were performed adrenal surgery from 1977 to 1995. Patients averaged 46.8 years with the highest incidence in fifth and sixth decade comprising 71.7% and male to female ratio was 1:1. 21 tumors occured in the right adrenal gland and 20 in the left. The patients comprised 21 patients with adrenal cortical adenoma(12 nonfunctioning adrenocortical adenoma, 6 Cushing's syndrome, 3 primary aldosteronism), 11 patients with pheochromocytoma, 3 patients with adrenocortical carcinoma, 3 patients with metastatic carcinoma, 2 patients with lymphangioma and 1 patients with hemangioma, The main clinical manifestations of nonfunctioning tumor were abdominal pain, palpable mass and no subjective symptoms, and those of functioning tumors were headache, hypertension in pheochromocytoma and moon face, central obesity in Chushing's syndrome and hypertension, muscle weakness in primary aldosteronsim. The diagnosis of functioning adrenal tumors was possible by biochemical or endocrinologic studied and there were no abnormal laboratory findings in nonfunctioning tumors. Adrenal tumor localization was done by USG, CT, MRI. CT was the most commonly used localization method and had the highest diagnosis accuracy. All surgical apporaches were provided transperitoneally including subcostal incision in 27 cases, midline abdominal incision 9 cases and thoracoabdomonal incision 5 cases. There were no tumor recurrences and results of hormonal assay which were checked 1 day to 2 weeks postoperatively revealed normal or subnormal value. The average hospital stay was 10.4 days. Postoperative complication were noted that wound infection 4 cases, pulmonary complication 1.