Unusual bleeding of a giant cell fibroblastoma: a soft tissue sarcoma of the skin mimicking metastatic melanoma.

Abstract

A 56 year-old man presented to the emergency department after a spontaneous bleeding of a giant mass located on the right axilla. Clinical diagnosis was recurrent hemorrhagic nodular melanoma. Ten months previously a malignant melanoma had been removed from the dorsum by radical excision and surgical margins had been disease-free (MM: Breslow IV, Clark IV, lung and lynphnode metastases). The patient required immediate emergency surgical intervention to prevent death by hemorrhagic shock. The tumor was bleeding and the patient required a transfusion. Subjective symptoms included pain in palpation and spontaneous hemorrhage, poor general appearance, pale skin, BP 80/40 mmHg, HR 100/min with overall symptoms of hypovolemic shock. At the time of surgery, radical tumor excision was performed with an approximately 3 cm circumferential gross tumor free margin. The resultant defect was reconstructed by pectoral rotation fascio-cutaneous flap. The histological diagnosis demonstrated an undifferentiated high-grade pleomorphic sarcoma with microscopic tumor free margins.