unusual case of castleman's disease presenting as a neck mass

ABSTRACT

Castleman's disease is a rare distinctive form of lymphoid hyperplasia, Most commonly it is seen as solitary mediastinal tumor, although other anatomical sites like abdomen, head and neck and axilla can also be involved. Though head and neck is the second most common site of presentation only 60 cases have been reported so far in the literature 1, 2, Patient usually is asymptomatic and presents with solitary neck mass which is difficult to differentiate clinically from other benign or malignant neoplasms of the cervical region. It may be of unicentric, hyaline vascular variety which requires surgical excision and carries good prognosis or multicentric, plasma cell type which in addition to surgery may require chemotherapy, radiotherapy or steroids and has poorer prognosis. Since this disease is diagnosed histologically, one should always keep it in mind when dealing with long standing neck swelling, which is often misdiagnosed as tubercular lymphadenitis or other neoplasm of the neck. We report a histologically diagnosed, unusual and rare case of Castleman's disease in a 13 year old boy presenting with solitary neck mass