Surgical resection of solitary cardiophrenic lymph node metastasis by video-assisted thoracic surgery after complete resection of hepatocellular carcinoma

This report presents the case of a patient that developed a postoperative metastatic tumor in the cardiophrenic lymph node as a rare pattern of distant lymph node metastases of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) after a complete resection. This is the case of surgically and pathologically proved cardiophrenic lymph node metastasis of HCC using video-assisted thoracic surgery. General thoracic surgeons should therefore be aware of the possibility of this rare form of extrahepatic recurrence when a growing nodule is found in the pericardial fat pad during the follow-up of a malignancy in the liver.