Background: Cardiac tumours are rare but affected patients may present with symptoms mimicking other cardiac diseases. The most frequent symptoms include heart failure, arrhythmias, or embolic phenomena.
Case summary: A 39-year-old man with a history of extranodal NK/T-cell lymphoma of the nasal type (ENKTL-NT) in clinical remission presented at our department with incessant ventricular tachycardia. The arrhythmia could only be controlled with a combination of intravenously administered beta-blockers, ajmaline, and amiodarone. Diagnostic workup excluded ischaemia, but imaging revealed a tumour located in the apex of the left ventricle. Endomyocardial biopsy confirmed the diagnosis of cardiac relapse of ENKTL-NT. Upon chemotherapy no further arrhythmias developed.
Discussion: Many malignancies can metastasize into the heart. Multimodal imaging including echocardiography, cardiac magnetic resonance imaging, and a positron-emission tomography computed tomography paved the way to the diagnosis that was finally established by endomyocardial biopsy. In the present case, a cardiac metastasis from an ENKTL-NT presented with incessant ventricular tachycardia.
Keywords: Cardiac metastasis; Case report; Extranodal NK/T-cell lymphomas; Incessant ventricular tachycardia; Lymphoma.
© The Author(s) 2022. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the European Society of Cardiology.